Man behind the stick

Recent events and pronouncements by Ahmaghinejad and his clan have stirred flurry of worries in the international community. Although it is incumbent upon us to consider all efforts in the physical plane of reality to solve the problem - from diplomatic attempts to an all out military action - the Torah sages of all generations have always believed that such tyrant and evil people are nothing but an instrument in the hands of Hashem to wake up the Jewish people to do that which is right in the eyes of the Almighty, that is to make tshuva and lead a life imbued with Torah and mitzvot. They speak of a dog which is being attacked by a man holding a stick. The dog keeps barking and tries to bite the stick, not recognizing that there is a man behind the stick. The real reason that the dog is being attacked is the man, not the stick!

Now, I am not naive. I can see that you, my dear reader would read this and say to yourself that this guy (that is me) is crazy. This may be true, but in fact what I am telling you is not new. The Torah speaks of the Amalek nation who attacked the Jewish people at a weak spiritual point after they left Egypt. So it is embedded in the laws of spiritual dynamics that when we the Jewish people are spiritually weakened, the Divine Protection is removed from us and, as it were, we are left to fend for ourselves under the rules of physicality, that is the survival of the fittest. On the other hand, when we are spiritually heightened, that is when leaving our lives according to God-given Torah laws, the Divine Protection surrounds us and we are shielded from the elements. So, from an authentic Torah perspective, the likes of Haman, Hitler and Ahmaghinejad are nothing but evil manifesting in the physical world to wake up the Jewish people. I am not an expert, but many Jewish Classical sources such as 'Nefesh HaChaim' by Rav Chaim of Volozin speak about this topic in great detail.

Now, again I can see that you are saying to yourself that this crazy guy is a fear monger and using scare tactics to fulfill his agenda. Well, as for fear mongering and scare tactics, not at all, but as for having an agenda, definitely. My agenda is to encourage you to start asking questions, to pick up a Jewish book or visit a Torah-related Website, or talk to a good friend or a competent and God-fearing rabbi. My agenda is to encourage you to replace the Thursday night ‘Hokm Doreh’ at least once a month or even once a year before a Jewish Holiday like Yom Kippur, and to learn something about the significance of the day, before you torture yourself for 28 meaningless hours. What I am saying to you is that I am staying up till 3 in the morning to write this stuff, because I care for our Jewish Iranian community and I want to share with you something precious and very relevant to our lives. All I am doing is proposing to you to consider looking into the tradition of our forefathers, not under coercion from me or anyone else, but at your own pace and comfort level. If not for your own sake, at least for the sake of your children, and if you are not married or do not have children, I pray that Hashem grant you your beloved as soon as you are ready to build a beautiful Jewish home, and give you children.

So, with or without Ahmadinejads of the world, Hashem will run the world so that the world's ultimate purpose will be fulfilled. However, we the Jewish people play a major role in the ultimate purpose of the world. So, before you call me a fanatic and a messianic junkie, please open any daily or Shabbat siddur to the "Aleinu' prayer and look at the translation. It should not take you more than 4 minutes. Here it is; on page 161 of the Ashkenazi (oops) Artscroll Siddur:

"...Therefore we put our hope in You, Hashem our God, that we may soon see your mighty splendor, to remove detestable idolatry from the earth, and false gods will be utterly cut off, to perfect the universe through the Almighty's sovereignty. Then all humanity will call upon Your Name, to turn all the earth's wicked toward You. All the world's inhabitants will recognize and know that to You every knee should bend, every tongue should swear. Before You, Hashem, our God, they will bend every knee and cast themselves down and to the glory of Your Name they will render homage and they will all accept upon themselves$the yoke of Your kingship that you may reign over them soon and eternally. For the kingdom is Yours and You will reign for all eternity in glory as it is written in Your Torah: Hashem shall reign for all eternity. And it is said: Hashem will be King over all the World, on that day Hashem will be One and his Name will be One."

Now I am not making up this stuff, please check it out for yourself. Recognize that this is the same prayer that your grandparents were reciting in Kenissa Abrishami, Kenissa Mashadiah and in all other kennisas just before they were thrown out of Revolutionary Iran. More to the point, this is the same prayer that your forefathers were reciting for more than two thousand years under worst kind of anti-Semitism and threat of annihilation. But they were steadfast in their emuna and passed it on to us.

As you can see from the above prayer and myriad others, that history and humanity have an ultimate purpose, and that is, the universal recognition of God as Master of the world, with all its implications, which is beyond the scope of this essay and monumentally beyond my knowledge. Suffice to say that man's purpose on earth can only be fulfilled and man can reach its ultimate perfection only by the universal recognition of God. So, the question is that who is going to teach humanity about the oneness of God and bring God's sovereignty to the world? My friend, this is the crux of what I have been trying to say: The Jews! It is the mission of the Jews to educate the world and teach them about God. If we do not agree on anything, I am sure that we will agree on this universal understanding that the other 2 great religions of the world, Christianity and Islam have branched off from Judaism. Now we must agree on this, because even the staunchest anti-Semites accept and acknowledge this fact.

Therefore, I hope that you come to realize what a huge responsibility you have. Yes, YOU! By being part of the Jewish people, Persian, Moroccan or American Jew, you have accepted upon yourself this responsibility. But you may say, "Wait a minute, no one ever asked me if I wanted to accept this responsibility and be part of it." Do I have news for you?! We just went through Pesach and read the Hagaddah; like it or not, your Neshamah was next to mine when we left Egypt together and stood at Mount Sinai together. We heard the first 2 commandments straight from God's mouth and our souls left our bodies. Eventually, we came about and accepted the 10 commandments, and later on the entire Torah upon ourselves, by saying Naaseh V’ Nishma; ‘we will do and we will then understand'. Please come to appreciate 2 fine points here. First, hear and witness the universal message of Judaism. We as a religion do not advocate that every one has to become Jewish or otherwise go to hell, as is the favorable and popular view of other religions. Second, we are not to educate the world with God-consciousness by coercion and force; only by example, by being a 'Light onto the Nations'. Now, we have partially succeeded in bringing God's awareness to the world through other religions, but as you can see this awareness is skewed and has caused tremendous suffering throughout history, Mr. Ahmaghinejad not withstanding. We still have a lot of work to do, and it starts at home with the Jewish people. We need to perfect ourselves as a God-conscious community before we can affect others. And in order to do that, we have the Torah, the instructions for living. We have to create a perfect society of Jews that will become an example for others, again just through example, no coercion. This is what the Almighty wants from us the Jews.

And now I hope that you come to see why evil hits us when we are not at our maximum spiritual heights. It hits us because we are interfering with Hashem's plans for the world. And it is not that He is punishing us for the sake of punishment, no, God’s punishment is therapeutic, it is for the purpose of awakening us to recognize our responsibility, that which we (that is you and I) collectively accepted upon ourselves at Mount Sinai, there is no way out.

Please come to recognize that I am not asking you to believe any of this stuff. All I am hoping is that you will be inspired to look into these issues and make up your own informed decisions. All of what I have said are from authentic and classic Jewish sources and can be verified. I hope that you will take upon yourself to try to verify my claims. In fact, I suppose that you are somehow, directly or tangentially affiliated with a kenissah, a shul, a temple or a bet kenesset. Why not ask the rabbi or some of your friends there? Better yet, print this and pass it over in the Thursday night ‘ghomar doreh’, you may become a hit, literally!

As for the kenissah, shul, temple or bet kenesset, just a word of caution; there are plenty of varieties around. They invite you to their place, fill you up with honor and then take you dry for your membership. We are talking big dollars here. Now, you are innocent, you want to hang around the big shots, you want to see and to be seen. You want to marry or marry off your kids to the richest bidder. You are presented with a 'lollypop' or 'feel-good' version of Judaism, that you do not have to work hard to reach your purpose, just pay your membership and attend the occasional meeting on fixing the world. They tell you that there is no historical or archeological evidence of Jews leaving Egypt, but there is ample historical or archeological evidence that beyond the shadow of the doubt, the pious God-fearing Jewish men and women have always prayed side by side in a mix setting, since the Temple times!. And they warn you not to be so fanatic and not to bother with such fine subtleties as microphones and driving to temple on Shabbat. And there are those who tell you that it is enough to be a good person, not even a Jew. There are those who tell you that you are a racist if you insist on only marrying a Jew. So, as you can see there are many different flavors in this marketplace of ideas and you need to be careful and not to take anything or anyone for granted, including me and my comments.

Please investigate and do not let your life style and your pre-conceived ideas bribe you.