It is a hit, because it only can be a hit and we are so mild and cute, nice and lovely: "Mi ohev otach yoter mimeni\מי אוהב אותך יותר ממני = who loves you more than I love you" is the sort of syrupy, ever broadcast song sung by many local singers. We are so much in need of care, cuddling, hugging and know that our hearts can share with a soul mate, a sweetheart, beloved, girl/boyfriend, eventually a date, a boo, someone we can love more than anybody could love her or him...
Is it the price of solitude? Or is love so natural? The rape of the Sabine women is a Roman Empire saga and supposedly consisted, to begin with, in the abduction of the women. Indeed, the abduction conducted to rape. Rape of foreign women is strongly condemned by Moses in the name of God as a sign of idolatry. As time passes, it is so amazing and weird to read the news about the development of different attitudes in Israeli society. Rape, incest, men raping their wives, women raping men at times, children or teens submitted to sexual assaults and the head of the State crashing down for forced and thus not so clear carnal temptations. A lot of men are harassed by women or girls and children can be physically abused by their parents even in the more religious families.
The Semites are inspirited by violence and baseless instinct of possession. This is what is softly meant by "yoter mimeni\יותר ממני = who loves you more that I do?". Okay a very honey-honey song with sugar and slow-slow rhythm but the guy does possess the girl and that's it. And girls can possess guys and guys think they own their friends. This is love, nu-nu?
On the forthcoming Wednesday 5th of August 2009, we shall celebrate Tu Be'Av\ט"ו באב = the 15th of the month of Av. It is usually called "Chag HaAhavah\חג האהבה = Feast of love". At the present we are very fond of such feasts that allow giving flowers or presents to our special one. It may happen that the special one may grow to two, well… say not more, but there can be no special one at all. The worldwide celebrated Saint Valentine’s Day, in February, would seem rather parallel. This is not really the case. Tu Be’Av (like Tu bishvat\ט"ו בשבט = New Year of the Trees) falls on the 15th day of the Jewish month. In this particular case, it falls in the middle of the month of Av, i.e. one of the most tragic months in the Jewish history with the Ninth (tisha) of Av that for ever memorizes the “saddest days” of the two destructions of the Temple and of the city of Jerusalem. The 15th day always marks in the Jewish calendar the short time of the lunar cycle monthly recurring “full moon” (“Hayireah bimlu’o\הירח במלואו”). This is why the indefeasible faithfulness of God was disclosed so many times throughout history as mentioned by Talmud Taanit 26a, 30-31b. Is it not appealing that the Jewish tradition is never overcome by disasters, destructions, death, exterminations? And that Tu Be’Av, in the heat of summertime, should be the most joyous day of the year when the moon is full as ready to birthing new times and seasons.
Let’s talk a bit about tradition: it is said that Yom Kippur and Tu Be’Av are the two happiest days of the Jewish year. This relies upon the related birthing process that leaps over death to introduce into new months and times (Taanit 4,3). On that very day of the 15th of Av, in the fortieth year in the wilderness, the Israelites stopped dying in the desert. The clear sign of joy appears with the reply of the women to the punishment imposed by God to those who did believe the spies who slandered against Moses. Indeed, men were and remain too important for women. Here is the interesting point of “the feast of love”: the daughters of Zelophehad came to speak with Moses and the priest Eleazar and they were upset (Num.27:1-11). Their father had died in the desert, there were no men and they wanted men and inheritance! This is the very Hebrew counter-point to “the rape of the Sabine women”! This also became a day of “duty-free” service in a very tribally structured society. Thus as it also developed after the destructions of the Temple, young girls and women could dress humbly and go dancing through the streets and on the squares and look for some nice lad and possible bridegroom. It was a “duty-free” day in the sense that women could marry any member of any tribe as also, the sons of the tribe of Benjamin.
As the Zohar states, the Jewish people are like the moon: going up and falling down, erring and reaching goals and then getting lost again. But every step allows enhancing the quality of a new rise towards God and the Mitzvot.
“Veahavta lereacha kamocha\ואהבת לרעך כמוך – and you shall love your fellowman as yourself” (Vayikra 19:18). We are submitted to “love” because only God is Love. But as we just remembered the destruction of the Temples, we could reflect upon the fact that the first Temple was ruined due to rational and conscious hatred while the second Temple was razed out of a baseless / irrational hatred. Now what happens if we compare these two reasons that prevailed for the destructions with the joyful “full moon” marriage chasing that became a “feast of love”. Sex is a very small part of what love implies and encompasses. Nonetheless, at the present, in Israeli society, it shows to prevail as it always did throughout the TaNaKh: with much confusion of feelings, irrational pulses or slanders.
When the daughters of Zelophehad came to petition Moses they did not ask for love: they asked for men and inheritance, which means they wanted to birth babies and be secured as women. Women do need to be financially and socially secured even if they often initiate or support business developed by men. These daughters had a basic request: we need men to prolong the tribe – indeed all the tribes – that died in the wilderness and we need money, land, properties. At this point, it is evident that Tu Be’Av is a feast for women as they choose their partners, friends, special ones or husbands. Men often don’t get to that. It is at times horrible to observe or even to audit how women are treated with much disregard and total lack of respect in Israeli society and Jewishness. It is incredible that the number of battered women, as also men and children continues to increase and shows difficult to stop. Each sex is more and more victimized by rapes, incest and this is in full contradiction with the realm of the Mitzvot a proper and traditional, usual family and lifestyle.
This is why more and more youths need to be coached, guided or “cured”. When the children of divorced or even multi-reconstituted families “live together” in order to feel some warmth and support each other, they were hardly prepared to any real “love” and awkwardly move ahead or stay on stand by knowing nothing or ignoring the risks of STD or venereal diseases. I see this in at many different levels of the inhabitants and this is the real quest. This is why acting “theology” does not consist in parroting pious words of the Sages. Early in the morning or at night, when youngsters are spaced out because they can only be drug-addicted, they firstly need a hand. They gather in special areas of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and other towns. But this hand must be full of understanding and, truly, the tradition of the Sages does provide a lot of answers to face the terrible increase of impoverishment. Impoverishment also includes lack of real love.
Love is not only lovemaking with condoms, pills, abortion. Thus it can be reduced to a speechless relationship without sincere and open talk. There is often nothing to share except bones playing with bones under skin. Indeed, the Jewish tradition has developed a highly positive view of sexuality. At the present, the situation is a bit confused. Personalized desires of groups of individuals, egoistic and rather childlike behaviors tend to imbalance the relationships in new couples. I recently heard two olot chadashot/female newcomers explaining that, according to the tradition, they were only obliged to have sex with their husbands on a regular basis, wash up the dishes, keep the house clean and get the more possible money. Plain and simple. This is another aspect in a country where it is rather difficult to marry and, till today, to find love outside of one’s own tribe (Ashkenazim, Sephardim, Mizrachim… and why not any other tribe living in Eretz Esrael).
Love is a gift, a real gift sent by God. Love is like a miracle and it is a miracle that is renewed everyday in so many families. And love can show at any age. A woman physician was visiting Jerusalem with her daughter who was leaving for the Army. They were not Jewish according to the Halachah. The mother suddenly asked: “Is it so important to be Jewish?” She had been abandoned by her husband. She was surprised when I replied: “Don’t you think love is more important than anything else?”. Or the contact with a rabbi, who did not know what to do: his wife got fascinated by the Gospel right out of the blue moon. We had exceptional discussions: yes, he had the possibility to divorce her, but, she was still Jewish and, by the way, did he love her? They did not quit.
Jesus started his preaching by assisting at a marriage in Cana of Galilee (John 2:1-11) and two Jewish miztvot/commandments were evident to him. He never denied them: marriage and priesthood. “Love” is a major motto for any Christian believer, just as “joy” (Saint Francis of Assisi, Saint Seraphim of Sarov). As regards “love” we might not be quite aware how milder, more caring, compassionate the world of the heathens became through Christendom. We don’t have any idea of the hideous violence that existed in the Barbarian society, even if new paganism recently emerged out of various trends.
This year, on Tu Be’av it would be so be so tender, like God: “HaShem, El rachum vechanun\ה' ה' אל רחום וחנון, Lord, Lord of mercy and loving-kindness”. And then we could also discover each other, without fear.
av Aleksander [Winogradsky Frenkel]
August 1/ July 19, 2007 – 11 deAv 5767 - י"א דאב תשס"ט
Is it the price of solitude? Or is love so natural? The rape of the Sabine women is a Roman Empire saga and supposedly consisted, to begin with, in the abduction of the women. Indeed, the abduction conducted to rape. Rape of foreign women is strongly condemned by Moses in the name of God as a sign of idolatry. As time passes, it is so amazing and weird to read the news about the development of different attitudes in Israeli society. Rape, incest, men raping their wives, women raping men at times, children or teens submitted to sexual assaults and the head of the State crashing down for forced and thus not so clear carnal temptations. A lot of men are harassed by women or girls and children can be physically abused by their parents even in the more religious families.
The Semites are inspirited by violence and baseless instinct of possession. This is what is softly meant by "yoter mimeni\יותר ממני = who loves you more that I do?". Okay a very honey-honey song with sugar and slow-slow rhythm but the guy does possess the girl and that's it. And girls can possess guys and guys think they own their friends. This is love, nu-nu?
On the forthcoming Wednesday 5th of August 2009, we shall celebrate Tu Be'Av\ט"ו באב = the 15th of the month of Av. It is usually called "Chag HaAhavah\חג האהבה = Feast of love". At the present we are very fond of such feasts that allow giving flowers or presents to our special one. It may happen that the special one may grow to two, well… say not more, but there can be no special one at all. The worldwide celebrated Saint Valentine’s Day, in February, would seem rather parallel. This is not really the case. Tu Be’Av (like Tu bishvat\ט"ו בשבט = New Year of the Trees) falls on the 15th day of the Jewish month. In this particular case, it falls in the middle of the month of Av, i.e. one of the most tragic months in the Jewish history with the Ninth (tisha) of Av that for ever memorizes the “saddest days” of the two destructions of the Temple and of the city of Jerusalem. The 15th day always marks in the Jewish calendar the short time of the lunar cycle monthly recurring “full moon” (“Hayireah bimlu’o\הירח במלואו”). This is why the indefeasible faithfulness of God was disclosed so many times throughout history as mentioned by Talmud Taanit 26a, 30-31b. Is it not appealing that the Jewish tradition is never overcome by disasters, destructions, death, exterminations? And that Tu Be’Av, in the heat of summertime, should be the most joyous day of the year when the moon is full as ready to birthing new times and seasons.
Let’s talk a bit about tradition: it is said that Yom Kippur and Tu Be’Av are the two happiest days of the Jewish year. This relies upon the related birthing process that leaps over death to introduce into new months and times (Taanit 4,3). On that very day of the 15th of Av, in the fortieth year in the wilderness, the Israelites stopped dying in the desert. The clear sign of joy appears with the reply of the women to the punishment imposed by God to those who did believe the spies who slandered against Moses. Indeed, men were and remain too important for women. Here is the interesting point of “the feast of love”: the daughters of Zelophehad came to speak with Moses and the priest Eleazar and they were upset (Num.27:1-11). Their father had died in the desert, there were no men and they wanted men and inheritance! This is the very Hebrew counter-point to “the rape of the Sabine women”! This also became a day of “duty-free” service in a very tribally structured society. Thus as it also developed after the destructions of the Temple, young girls and women could dress humbly and go dancing through the streets and on the squares and look for some nice lad and possible bridegroom. It was a “duty-free” day in the sense that women could marry any member of any tribe as also, the sons of the tribe of Benjamin.
As the Zohar states, the Jewish people are like the moon: going up and falling down, erring and reaching goals and then getting lost again. But every step allows enhancing the quality of a new rise towards God and the Mitzvot.
“Veahavta lereacha kamocha\ואהבת לרעך כמוך – and you shall love your fellowman as yourself” (Vayikra 19:18). We are submitted to “love” because only God is Love. But as we just remembered the destruction of the Temples, we could reflect upon the fact that the first Temple was ruined due to rational and conscious hatred while the second Temple was razed out of a baseless / irrational hatred. Now what happens if we compare these two reasons that prevailed for the destructions with the joyful “full moon” marriage chasing that became a “feast of love”. Sex is a very small part of what love implies and encompasses. Nonetheless, at the present, in Israeli society, it shows to prevail as it always did throughout the TaNaKh: with much confusion of feelings, irrational pulses or slanders.
When the daughters of Zelophehad came to petition Moses they did not ask for love: they asked for men and inheritance, which means they wanted to birth babies and be secured as women. Women do need to be financially and socially secured even if they often initiate or support business developed by men. These daughters had a basic request: we need men to prolong the tribe – indeed all the tribes – that died in the wilderness and we need money, land, properties. At this point, it is evident that Tu Be’Av is a feast for women as they choose their partners, friends, special ones or husbands. Men often don’t get to that. It is at times horrible to observe or even to audit how women are treated with much disregard and total lack of respect in Israeli society and Jewishness. It is incredible that the number of battered women, as also men and children continues to increase and shows difficult to stop. Each sex is more and more victimized by rapes, incest and this is in full contradiction with the realm of the Mitzvot a proper and traditional, usual family and lifestyle.
This is why more and more youths need to be coached, guided or “cured”. When the children of divorced or even multi-reconstituted families “live together” in order to feel some warmth and support each other, they were hardly prepared to any real “love” and awkwardly move ahead or stay on stand by knowing nothing or ignoring the risks of STD or venereal diseases. I see this in at many different levels of the inhabitants and this is the real quest. This is why acting “theology” does not consist in parroting pious words of the Sages. Early in the morning or at night, when youngsters are spaced out because they can only be drug-addicted, they firstly need a hand. They gather in special areas of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and other towns. But this hand must be full of understanding and, truly, the tradition of the Sages does provide a lot of answers to face the terrible increase of impoverishment. Impoverishment also includes lack of real love.
Love is not only lovemaking with condoms, pills, abortion. Thus it can be reduced to a speechless relationship without sincere and open talk. There is often nothing to share except bones playing with bones under skin. Indeed, the Jewish tradition has developed a highly positive view of sexuality. At the present, the situation is a bit confused. Personalized desires of groups of individuals, egoistic and rather childlike behaviors tend to imbalance the relationships in new couples. I recently heard two olot chadashot/female newcomers explaining that, according to the tradition, they were only obliged to have sex with their husbands on a regular basis, wash up the dishes, keep the house clean and get the more possible money. Plain and simple. This is another aspect in a country where it is rather difficult to marry and, till today, to find love outside of one’s own tribe (Ashkenazim, Sephardim, Mizrachim… and why not any other tribe living in Eretz Esrael).
Love is a gift, a real gift sent by God. Love is like a miracle and it is a miracle that is renewed everyday in so many families. And love can show at any age. A woman physician was visiting Jerusalem with her daughter who was leaving for the Army. They were not Jewish according to the Halachah. The mother suddenly asked: “Is it so important to be Jewish?” She had been abandoned by her husband. She was surprised when I replied: “Don’t you think love is more important than anything else?”. Or the contact with a rabbi, who did not know what to do: his wife got fascinated by the Gospel right out of the blue moon. We had exceptional discussions: yes, he had the possibility to divorce her, but, she was still Jewish and, by the way, did he love her? They did not quit.
Jesus started his preaching by assisting at a marriage in Cana of Galilee (John 2:1-11) and two Jewish miztvot/commandments were evident to him. He never denied them: marriage and priesthood. “Love” is a major motto for any Christian believer, just as “joy” (Saint Francis of Assisi, Saint Seraphim of Sarov). As regards “love” we might not be quite aware how milder, more caring, compassionate the world of the heathens became through Christendom. We don’t have any idea of the hideous violence that existed in the Barbarian society, even if new paganism recently emerged out of various trends.
This year, on Tu Be’av it would be so be so tender, like God: “HaShem, El rachum vechanun\ה' ה' אל רחום וחנון, Lord, Lord of mercy and loving-kindness”. And then we could also discover each other, without fear.
av Aleksander [Winogradsky Frenkel]
August 1/ July 19, 2007 – 11 deAv 5767 - י"א דאב תשס"ט
1) Jealousy, zeal and emulation
With regard to the parshat Balak/פרשת בלק, we were rather busy in studying the spiritual commitment and assistance to humans provided by animals in the Scripture, in particular Balaam and his she-donkey. This showed how the animal's influence is still significant today as the Morning Prayer blessing starts with the words of Balaam. But this journey through the zoo theological assistance system did not allow us stopping at the major event that happened at the end of the reading portion (Bamidbar 25:1-9): the terrible account of the then-unheard "profaning of the Israelites at Shittim; they corrupted themselves by whoring (lezenot) with the daughters of Moab who invited them to the sacrifice for their god" (25:1-2). Thus, the Israelite Zimri publicly scorned at Moses and rejected the God of Israel and had open sexual intercourse with a Moabite.
This creates the link with "Pinchas (son of Eleazar son of Aaron)", the reading portion which mainly deals with passion, zealotry in Bemidbar 25:10-30:1.Of course, it might be astounding that a she-ass corrected Balaam’s words or that a cock crowed in the event of a prophesied treason. But "committing harlotry with Moabite women and worshiping their god Baal Peor)" seems totally natural in the present. It is almost not shocking. It is not even a real sin.
The Sages had time to explain things and, let’s be cool, there must be some misunderstandings somewhere about the event. The situation is not a real question because - yes, we never heard a police horse refrain his rider to stab demonstrators in a riot, if any. But physical prostitution with pagan women and men… good gracious! This is so ten a penny! And then to have some little worshiping party with gods that line from trees to boats, bananas and incense boxes is just as fit as a fiddle even among the most remote Jewish buddy boo networks. People can be put at the stake with this sexual games and the year has been a rather hot one until just this very hour.
The real problem with Pinchas is that the man seeing this blasphemous circus, got very hot and mad at the scene and put all his passion in getting rid of the profanation. The method is not common at the present. Baal Peor is a small bigotry god compared to the constellation that we developed in the name of all monotheistic beliefs and new paganism. "The Lord said to Moses: "Take all the heads of the people and have them impaled (hoka otam) before the Lord in front of the sun (neged hashemesh\נגד השמש = publicly)". Moses did listen to God, but one Israelite suddenly brought a Madianite woman for himself and his companions. Pinchas took a spear, followed them and stabbed her "in the belly - the maw/ el-kevatah\על קבתה". And God was pleased by Pinchas' passion to avenge the glorious Name of the Lord. God Himself sent a plague that killed twenty-four thousand people among the Israelites to punish their idolatry and harlotry. He thus also praised Pinchas and said: " I grant him My Pact of peace - et briti shalom\את בריתי שלום (wholeness, friendship, loyalty)”. Interestingly, God speaks about Pinchas as being “shalem – loyal” (1 Kings 8:61) or like Jacob who came back “shalem\שלם – safe and sound” to Sichem (Gen. 33:18). He acknowledges Pinchas as an “allied friend”, a “sholem\שולם – co-worker” (Tehillim 7:5). The “Berit shalom\ברית שלום – Pact of peace” definitely links Pinchas to the Prophet Elijah as regards the frenzy killings of the Baal worshipers perpetrated by the Prophet on Mount Carmel. It also connects to the “Covenant of peace” described by Prophet Isaiah 54:10: “The mountains may move, and the hills be shaken, my loyalty (chasdi\חסדי) shall never move from you, nor the Pact of My friendship (brit shlomi\ברית שלומי) be shaken – said the Lord with loving-kindness”.
There is a problem indeed. “Shalom\שלום” does not mean “peace”. Pinchas stabbing attitude that slaughtered a woman and her carnal partner through the maw (a bit bestial) corresponds with the order that God gave to Moses to impale all the idolaters and the whoring Israelites. At the present, after 2,000 years of squeamish strictness along the Diasporas, Judaism and Christianity have developed similar kinds of Puritanism and this Divine decree and Pinchas’ murder would be considered as a proof of some Old Testament avenging God of wrath. Generations of Jews and Christian alike have been educated with awe, which is contrasting with the Oriental Jewish and Christian tradition, basically because of the absence of the “Original sin theology” that is more pregnant in the East. But this weekly portion has raised awe and fear among both the Jews and the Christians.
We call peace all the day upon Jerusalem, upon the world. In Hebrew, it firstly means that we believe in “justice” as in this Pact concluded by God with Pinchas (Num. 25:12). Is it so inhuman to explain the situation in such a way? Or are we cheating and fooling each other and God’s Divine Presence as we gossip like in a parrot fashion about peace and have been paying billions of billions of new old currencies over centuries to reach some dubious cease-fire treaties? Moses officials impaled the wrongdoers and Pinchas got a covenant of friendship with God after his infuriated slaughter. Justice induces passion. This has nothing to do with our justice. Right and righteousness, legacy is an obsession in the Semitic and Greek-Latin world of the Scripture. It certainly brought some insights about the way love slowly showed up throughout the ages.
John the Baptist and Jesus have terrible words about God’s wrath, family hatred and wars (Matthew 3:10; 24:6).It is quite another prospect to say that one accepts God’s decisions: “Atah tzaddik al kol haba alay\אתה צדיק על כל הבא – You are just in all that happens to me” (Ps. 51:7). And we must handle these words very carefully because we do miss a lot a real understanding in terms of “verticality”, of God as acting in our lives like the woman towards Adam: “ezer kenegdo\עזר כנגדו = a helper against our will”.
Peace does not imply the absence of conflicts or a crooked method to avoid quarreling if not more. “Shalom” comes from “shalem\שלם” which may be broken down into a) “Hishlim\השלים – to complete” as “he freed his slave who completed the quorum of ten persons” (Berachot 47b); b) To end, cease: “They must fast the whole day till it ends”. (Yoma 82a); c) To make friends/ surrender: “He will pay does not mean money but that he will surrender the evil spirit and you will be friends” (Sukkot 52a). Thus “shalem\שלם” refers to payments as “wiping out a pending debt of any sort” or “to give a reward, a recompense”: “beshalom\בשלום – for the sake of total trust, faith, confidence”. We do not often think of the fact that “peace” includes and involves combats, payments, as “to redeem (padah\פדה) = to reimburse a debt or a loan over a long-term period.” “Peace” is fulfillment and achieving or reaching out to specific goals. “Menuchah\מנוחה – quietness” is closer to what we usually would consider as “hesychia – time of rests, silence” and peaceful balance.
The Israeli society can give the impression of a quiet and patient atmosphere. By the time of Pinchas and the episode with Baal-Peor, our ancestors might have been more “grilling on fires and boiling”. There is a lot of aggressiveness under control that bursts out of a sudden.
But the real problem is that Pinchas is a man of passion, a zealot; say, he is right but the way he corrects the situation is full of anger, passion, zeal and frankly beyond reason and irrationality. To begin with, “kinah-קנאה/Aramaic kina\קינא = jealousy, passion”: “My zeal for Your house has been my undoing (ate me up) / ki kinat beytcha achalteni\כי קנאת ביתך אכלתני” (Tehillim 69:10; cf. John 2:17). Or, “I am consumed with rage-zeal / Tzimtachteni kinati\צמחתני קנאתי” (Ps. 119:139). Prophet Elijah has the same when killing the worshipers of the Baal. It starts with a zeal than cannot be stopped in order to implement something considered as vital and true, essential. Passion is not only “pathos” or feelings that are close to cruel sufferings affecting thoughts, desires, impulses, reflections. This leads or can develop into some pathology indeed. “Jealousy, lust and ambition carry man out of the world (= he quits himself and reality)” (Avot 4:21).
On the other hand, “emulation among the scholars increases wisdom” (Bava Bathra 21a/22a). “Kanna’in/m-קנאין-ם” were the zealots during the siege of Jerusalem by the Romans (Numbers Rabba 20). The root means in the Semitic language an in-depth thirst that cannot be reasoned or quenched. It concerns the desire to possess and control truth. Then, people want to act in the name of this veracity or presupposed truth beyond any self-control or capacity of taking some distance. Judaism is curiously balanced with peaks of irrationality and acts of violence and a profound, unique sense of loving-kindness, compassion and analysis. In comparison, Russian “strasti/cтрастьи = (feelings of) passions” that may totally overcome and possess a soul with dangerous abilities to twirling passions and dreams. This may explain, for example, why Slavic souls extensively refer to dreams interpretation or underscore their importance in their subconscious, virtual and real day and night reality. The Semites are quite the same. Indeed, faith is the way to combat the raw basic instinct of fancies, fantasizing thoughts and attain a serene and untroubled state of spiritual and physical balance.
It is a gift to be given a “brit shalom\ברית שלום = Pact of friendship” sealed by God. Now, all the systems of beliefs and religion and thus Judaism, Christianity and Islam have shown horrible times when zealots acted as true “terrorists of God”. Purity of faith and acts often climaxed in the Kiddush HaShem\קידוש השם (sacrifice), as during the siege of Jerusalem or at Masada. But who can pretend to be an envoy of the Lord (the same exists among the Christian and Muslim without the problem of any “missionary activity”)? Who can have the nerve to work in the very Name of the Only One and claim to be zealous at the present, without confusion? Fencing and framing ourselves by rejecting the others softly or with violence and without any sense of tolerance or loving-kindness is a real danger of fundamentalism that affects every community, at least most of them. Identity is stronger at the moment than "being, existing" which is a true miracle of constant survival for the whole mankind.
Indeed, we seemingly go through new processes that would require to determine or give some precision about who we are. There are such periods in history. They show up and disappear on regular basis. But the real God-witnessing person or community is the one that in-depths remains open to the widest possible scope of what is humane and spiritual. They know their lives are built on miracles.
The root for “Kinah\קנאה = passion” is “to acquire”. This means that such envoys calling for peace were “acquired” by God and they did not capture Him. Talmud Tractate Gittin positively recounts the life and martyrdom of John the Baptist which the Eastern Orthodox Church will celebrate on Saturday, in particular in Ein Karem were his parents lived. His words of penance were zealous and apparently revengeful. On the other hand, it is certain that he was beheaded as the consequence of an autocrat’s passionate oath to accept any desire expressed by a power-thirsty daughter obeying to her corrupt mother (Matthew 14:10). In this full passion-consumed environment, John appears to be a man of peace and considered as a link with Prophet Elijah. True zealots either disappear in the merkavah-מרכבה/chariot or are humbled till they are beheaded but their souls can’t be killed. They emulate and sustain faith.
av aleksandr [Winogradsky Frenkel]
July 15/2, 2009 - 23 de Tamuz 5769 - כ"ג דתמוז תשס"ט