3,000 years after the Jewish people left Egyptian slavery bound for the land of Israel, their freedom remains as elusive as ever. A new Pharaoh adjacent not to the Nile, but the Potomac, looks out from the White House and issues his decrees regarding the Jews.
No sooner does a Jew build a house in Jerusalem, than one of the Pharaoh's flunkies rushes to condemn him for it. A week before Passover, one of those flunkies announced that the administration was both "deeply concerned" and "very worried" about new Jewish homes in Jerusalem. A day later Jewish families hoping to be able to live in their own holy city were greeted with the announcement that approval for more housing had been suspended to avoid offending the little man with the big ears in the White House.
The Obama Administration has spent more time condemning housing in Jerusalem, than genocide in the Sudan. If some parts of Israel are constantly being shelled by terrorists, the Gilo neighborhood of Jerusalem is constantly being shelled by administration spokesmen. Year after year, the people of an overcrowded city are frustrated in their efforts to find a place to live, when some White House or State Department flunky finishes sipping his coffee, gets up in front of a microphone and expresses the grave concern of his master that a new condominium might go up in a place where Jews had been living long before the religion of Obama's grandmother was even a twinkle in her mad prophet's eye.
Building permits in Jerusalem now undergo a perverse kind of astrology. Approvals for every stage of the process must happen at a time when no administration official is visiting Jerusalem, and no Israeli official is visiting the US. When Biden visited Jerusalem at the same time that a municipal housing approval came through-- the administration staged a convulsive spectacle.
Biden threw a fit and stood up Netanyahu, Hillary Clinton shrilled that the housing approvals "were not only an insult to Biden, but an insult to the United States" and then spent 43 minutes berating the prime minister over the phone over what would have been a minor municipal issue in her own country. "There was an affront, it was an insult", chimed in David Axelrod. A hundred media outlets took up the theme. The theme being that the Jews had gotten so arrogant that they were approving construction in their own city at the same time that a politician who had three times endorsed Jerusalem as the undivided capital had stopped by for a visit.
Pharaoh was determined to prevent the Jewish people from going off to build their own country. And now Obama is determined that Jews should not build in their own city. There is a vicious irony in the administration applying such repression before Passover, a holiday of free men and women taken out of the bonds of Egypt against the will of its tyrant. A reminder that the millions of Jews who cry out, "Next Year in Jerusalem" are reminded that a new tyrant bars their way.
In his Passover message, Obama cited the Islamist revolts in the Muslim world as embodying the message of the holiday. Applying the message of a holiday in which the Jewish people were liberated from Egypt-- to celebrate rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, which seeks to wipe out the Jewish people, is willfully perverse. The Bible says of Pharaoh that he rose as a new King who did not know Joseph. Obama clearly does not know Joseph, but he is quite familiar with Mohammed.
When Obama visited Egypt, souvenirs were sold of him in Pharaonic garb calling him "The New Tutankhamen", after the Pharaoh who falsely pretended to be of a religion that he was not in order to revert its monotheism to polytheism. Obama has credited his Cairo speech with the Egyptian revolution. Seen in that light his Passover message is the ultimate act of egocentrism, crediting himself as the ultimate embodiment of Passover. There is something of the Pharaoh looking out upon the Nile in such self-adoration.
From the Muslim Brotherhood to the Palestinian Authority-- the new slaughter of Jewish infants is backed by the authority of the United States government. And a new generation of Jewish overseers, from organizations such as J-Street, compels obedience to the man whose government is pushing hard for the creation of a genocidal Palestinian state.
It is not hard to hear the mad echoes of that ancient Pharaoh conspiring with his courtiers, issuing press releases on the projected benefits of his Slavery 2300 initiative, and berating his Jewish overseers for not pushing their brethren hard enough. And as with all master-slave relations it is hard to know whom to be more disgusted by. The Pharaoh whose ego outshines all other considerations or the slaves who bow under the lash of his wrath.
The cyclical nature of history is both our blessing and our curse. It allows us to learn from the past, which torments us by its repetition. The Pharaohs come and go. Blazing stars of ego that crash against the heavens and fall back as cinders to fertilize the soil of history. As do their followers. The lessons go more unlearned, than learned. And so the wheel turns again. Like a puppet in a Punch and Judy show, Pharaoh rises and postures, shakes a tiny fist at the heavens, and proclaims his supremacy. The lesson that follows is not for his benefit, but for ours. The egomaniac never learns any better. Nor do the blank hordes who enlist in his cult of personality. It is the people who know better but remain silent who must learn.
No one who reads the Bible can help but measure when the conduct of the pharaohs topple from cruelty into madness. When self-interest turns to self-destruction. The enslavement of the Jews begins as a means to an end, the glorification of the reign of the ruler, and ends as an goal in and of itself that destroys all the ends it was meant to serve. This is how tyranny always ends, its execution destroying its justifications. The economic programs of Nazism and Communism still ended in poverty and ruin, no matter how many rivers of blood they spilled. Evil destroys itself, but first it destroys a great deal else.
In his final lecture before fleeing the Soviet Union, Rabbi Moshe Feinstein warned that the exile of the spirit is worse than the slavery of the flesh. It is the first exile and the final exile. Before the body is enslaved, the spirit is enslaved. And even after the body is free, the spirit still goes on in chains.
That is why the physical slavery of the Jews in Egypt fell far short of the 400 years that had been foretold to Abraham. For the slavery of the spirit precedes and endures past the actual slavery. Even when they were prosperous citizens of Egypt before the chains fell on them and after when they marched out highhandedly as a liberated people-- the shackles had not fallen from their spirit. They were free by law, but slavery had crept into their souls. The message of that final climactic night, to slaughter a sheep and paint its blood upon their doorposts was a declaration of freedom, to kill the sheep within. The herd animal that longed for slavery and that even in the desert turned its eyes back to the place of its servitude.The Jews had come to Egypt as shepherds, but Egypt had turned them into sheep.
The liberation began when Moshe and Aaron stood before Pharaoh and dared to say to him, what none had dared to say before. Let My People Go. With those words the end had come. Not with mere force but by establishing a superior moral authority to that of the tyrant. It is easy to be a slave, when you have no higher principle than the authority of the system. And to be free, you must find a higher principle than that authority or you will be forever a slave.
Few tyrants rule solely by force. Their authority derives from their insistence that they represent the common good. To challenge them is to undermine the common good. Their way is the way of peace. The way of the Peace Process, which has converted Israel from a strong and secure nation, to a divided nation pierced by a genocidal enemy state inside its territory. It is in everyone's best interests to follow the will of the tyrant. To oppose him is to disrupt the harmony. Building homes in Jerusalem is disruptive. It is not peaceful. Why? Because that is what the tyrant says. And to accede to that is to accept the moral authority of his rule.
"Let My People Go", redefined the men and women who had been Pharaoh's slaves as "Ami", the People of G-d. Not slaves of a tyrant, but a people and a nation whose only allegiance was to their Creator. To say to a tyrant, "Let My People Go" is to deny his physical and moral authority. His right to dispose of their lives as he sees fit. It begins the process of breaking the chains of the flesh, by breaking the chains of the spirit that binds a people to slavery.
Obama, Let My People Go. Let them go live in Jerusalem and throughout their land. Take away your chains and your pyramids and your Palestinian state. Stop your financing of Islamic terrorists. Keep your press releases and your flacks, and your notes of "deep concern" every time a hammer hits a nail in territory claimed by your Islamic friends. Your way is not that of peace, but of appeasement. Your law is the will of terrorists and their enablers. This is not your land. It is not the land of the Muslim conquerors whose rights you so assiduously defend. You have no physical or moral authority here.
Let my people go.
The Obama Administration has spent more time condemning housing in Jerusalem, than genocide in the Sudan. If some parts of Israel are constantly being shelled by terrorists, the Gilo neighborhood of Jerusalem is constantly being shelled by administration spokesmen. Year after year, the people of an overcrowded city are frustrated in their efforts to find a place to live, when some White House or State Department flunky finishes sipping his coffee, gets up in front of a microphone and expresses the grave concern of his master that a new condominium might go up in a place where Jews had been living long before the religion of Obama's grandmother was even a twinkle in her mad prophet's eye.
Building permits in Jerusalem now undergo a perverse kind of astrology. Approvals for every stage of the process must happen at a time when no administration official is visiting Jerusalem, and no Israeli official is visiting the US. When Biden visited Jerusalem at the same time that a municipal housing approval came through-- the administration staged a convulsive spectacle.
Biden threw a fit and stood up Netanyahu, Hillary Clinton shrilled that the housing approvals "were not only an insult to Biden, but an insult to the United States" and then spent 43 minutes berating the prime minister over the phone over what would have been a minor municipal issue in her own country. "There was an affront, it was an insult", chimed in David Axelrod. A hundred media outlets took up the theme. The theme being that the Jews had gotten so arrogant that they were approving construction in their own city at the same time that a politician who had three times endorsed Jerusalem as the undivided capital had stopped by for a visit.
Pharaoh was determined to prevent the Jewish people from going off to build their own country. And now Obama is determined that Jews should not build in their own city. There is a vicious irony in the administration applying such repression before Passover, a holiday of free men and women taken out of the bonds of Egypt against the will of its tyrant. A reminder that the millions of Jews who cry out, "Next Year in Jerusalem" are reminded that a new tyrant bars their way.
In his Passover message, Obama cited the Islamist revolts in the Muslim world as embodying the message of the holiday. Applying the message of a holiday in which the Jewish people were liberated from Egypt-- to celebrate rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, which seeks to wipe out the Jewish people, is willfully perverse. The Bible says of Pharaoh that he rose as a new King who did not know Joseph. Obama clearly does not know Joseph, but he is quite familiar with Mohammed.
When Obama visited Egypt, souvenirs were sold of him in Pharaonic garb calling him "The New Tutankhamen", after the Pharaoh who falsely pretended to be of a religion that he was not in order to revert its monotheism to polytheism. Obama has credited his Cairo speech with the Egyptian revolution. Seen in that light his Passover message is the ultimate act of egocentrism, crediting himself as the ultimate embodiment of Passover. There is something of the Pharaoh looking out upon the Nile in such self-adoration.
From the Muslim Brotherhood to the Palestinian Authority-- the new slaughter of Jewish infants is backed by the authority of the United States government. And a new generation of Jewish overseers, from organizations such as J-Street, compels obedience to the man whose government is pushing hard for the creation of a genocidal Palestinian state.
The cyclical nature of history is both our blessing and our curse. It allows us to learn from the past, which torments us by its repetition. The Pharaohs come and go. Blazing stars of ego that crash against the heavens and fall back as cinders to fertilize the soil of history. As do their followers. The lessons go more unlearned, than learned. And so the wheel turns again. Like a puppet in a Punch and Judy show, Pharaoh rises and postures, shakes a tiny fist at the heavens, and proclaims his supremacy. The lesson that follows is not for his benefit, but for ours. The egomaniac never learns any better. Nor do the blank hordes who enlist in his cult of personality. It is the people who know better but remain silent who must learn.
No one who reads the Bible can help but measure when the conduct of the pharaohs topple from cruelty into madness. When self-interest turns to self-destruction. The enslavement of the Jews begins as a means to an end, the glorification of the reign of the ruler, and ends as an goal in and of itself that destroys all the ends it was meant to serve. This is how tyranny always ends, its execution destroying its justifications. The economic programs of Nazism and Communism still ended in poverty and ruin, no matter how many rivers of blood they spilled. Evil destroys itself, but first it destroys a great deal else.
In his final lecture before fleeing the Soviet Union, Rabbi Moshe Feinstein warned that the exile of the spirit is worse than the slavery of the flesh. It is the first exile and the final exile. Before the body is enslaved, the spirit is enslaved. And even after the body is free, the spirit still goes on in chains.
That is why the physical slavery of the Jews in Egypt fell far short of the 400 years that had been foretold to Abraham. For the slavery of the spirit precedes and endures past the actual slavery. Even when they were prosperous citizens of Egypt before the chains fell on them and after when they marched out highhandedly as a liberated people-- the shackles had not fallen from their spirit. They were free by law, but slavery had crept into their souls. The message of that final climactic night, to slaughter a sheep and paint its blood upon their doorposts was a declaration of freedom, to kill the sheep within. The herd animal that longed for slavery and that even in the desert turned its eyes back to the place of its servitude.The Jews had come to Egypt as shepherds, but Egypt had turned them into sheep.
The liberation began when Moshe and Aaron stood before Pharaoh and dared to say to him, what none had dared to say before. Let My People Go. With those words the end had come. Not with mere force but by establishing a superior moral authority to that of the tyrant. It is easy to be a slave, when you have no higher principle than the authority of the system. And to be free, you must find a higher principle than that authority or you will be forever a slave.
"Let My People Go", redefined the men and women who had been Pharaoh's slaves as "Ami", the People of G-d. Not slaves of a tyrant, but a people and a nation whose only allegiance was to their Creator. To say to a tyrant, "Let My People Go" is to deny his physical and moral authority. His right to dispose of their lives as he sees fit. It begins the process of breaking the chains of the flesh, by breaking the chains of the spirit that binds a people to slavery.
Obama, Let My People Go. Let them go live in Jerusalem and throughout their land. Take away your chains and your pyramids and your Palestinian state. Stop your financing of Islamic terrorists. Keep your press releases and your flacks, and your notes of "deep concern" every time a hammer hits a nail in territory claimed by your Islamic friends. Your way is not that of peace, but of appeasement. Your law is the will of terrorists and their enablers. This is not your land. It is not the land of the Muslim conquerors whose rights you so assiduously defend. You have no physical or moral authority here.
Let my people go.
Comments
Yet so many Jews where so glad to vote for him to have a first black man to the white-house to show how equalitarian we are. See how he shows his gratitude for this support. Always Jews have been in the forefront of liberation movements or progressive movements to be scorned by those they helped after the aim was reached. Many of the blacks of America preferred becoming Muslims after having achieved equal rights in the fight for black equality in American society where several Jews lost their lives, while Islam did even in that era only enslave them, Obama offends Israel while the Muslims laugh at him and his apologetic speeches.
ReplyDeleteExcellent article. I wish this issue would be addressed more often. I find it unbelievable and think it is so arrogant of Obama, the Pope, or any other politician of any nation to think they have the right to tell the Jewish people where they can build homes in their own country.
ReplyDeleteKriska
This is without a doubt your best article! So much truth and clarity.
ReplyDelete"In his Passover message, Obama cited the Islamist revolts in the Muslim world as embodying the message of the holiday. Applying the message of a holiday in which the Jewish people were liberated from Egypt-- to celebrate rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, which seeks to wipe out the Jewish people, is willfully perverse. The Bible says of Pharaoh that he rose as a new King who did not know Joseph. Obama clearly does not know Joseph, but he is quite familiar with Mohammed."
Obama's policy on Israel!
When I hear someone expressing Pharaonic horror at the thought of Jewish building in Eretz Israel, I want to flash them a map highlighing the world's Islamic territories along with Israel's sliver of land.
ReplyDeleteDaniel - you wrote "You have no physical or moral authority here." No moral authority, I agree. Significant physical authority in the region does, however, accrue to the U.S. by virtue of their realpolitikal clout. Not that that needs to exclusively define Israel's range of motion, but it must be taken into account. I expect a price will be paid for defying President Obama.
My take is that one of Obama's tasks in office, unbeknownst to him, is to distance Israel from the U.S., to reduce her psychological dependence upon the U.S. Not to sever ties, but to help Israel stand more on its own two feet.
In any case, I figure Pres. Obama is a one-termer.
Daniel
ReplyDeleteWhat a shame that it is Bibi - rather than you - who is the one who gets to talk to the Pharaoh.
The well-known verse that you quote is usually truncated. The second phrase is at least as important as the first. The entire verse is "Let my people go So they may serve me."
ReplyDeleteForget Obama. He will never be a friend to the Jews. He hates them. They will never garner his approval. After all, he is working for Satan - so why would he have any affection for the apple of God's eye? Israel (very sadly) needs to write off the US as someone who they need to approval of. Let the chips fall where they may. God is on their side - that is who they need to be relying on.
ReplyDeleteI rarely comment, and even more rarely qubile or disagree but, just this one quible,
ReplyDeletemy only quible comes at the end where you say "you have no moral authority here,"
obummer has no moral authority period. he's a purveyor of amoral authority, an enabler of diseased thinking. which is why he can never be trusted as an ally
Wow what an impact. Killing the sheep within, so the former shepherds could return to being shepherds. Wow. What a blessing to be a Jew and have the benefit of all of that understanding that we Gentiles have never really gotten the hang of. I pray that God moves to fulfill all of his promises to Israel. Thank you, Daniel, for light and reason, I love God's people.
ReplyDelete...Perhaps that dynamic is what causes so many black people to demand socialist government, maybe they need a way to kill the sheep within so they can become the shepherds God intended for them to be.
I was shocked to hear the other day that Israel only possess about 12% of the land that is rightfully theirs - the other 88% of their land as promised by YHVH in the Torah is occupied by their rivals. What is more shocking is that they are not even given the peaceful right to live in full freedom without fear of persecution in th 12% they occupy. The world leaders is shamefully again as they have for over 1500 years not spoken up for Israel. Israel is still in many ways the orphan child, cast aside - but God is not asleep - he will avenge His people.
ReplyDeleteI must say, Sultan Knish, this is probably your finest article that I have ever read. Beautiful. I really do pray (and vote)that this man is not here in office for the next 4 years.....
ReplyDeleteIt,s time to let your president go!
ReplyDeleteI find it amazing, in exodus 4 YY says telll paro that Israel is My son, let My son go, if you refuse I will slay your firstborn, none of the plagues has happened, Moses hasn't even visited Egypt yet.
The problem with Obama and all the nations is they don't know the narrative, don't know the same judgement applies, which is a bummer for Obama.
Anyway each year I buy Yehuda matzos as on the box it states made in Jerusalem, Israel. Ha! Kate b
It is not the American 'pharaoh' Obama who wields power over the Jewish state.
ReplyDeleteThat is a symptom, not the cause of their condition.
It is Israel's dependence upon American largess and support which forms the chains which bind Israel.
Until Israel abandons the belief that protection is needed, their very beliefs shall create a 'master' who rules over them.
The mental paradigm from which Israel views its situation creates all of the extending logic which creates its chains and allows the American pharaoh to dictate Israel's options.
Mindreader
ReplyDeleteYou mention about blacks converting to Islam, but there are more white converts. Texas has many white converts, and isn't Suhaib Webb, a former priest?
I read in the New York Times I think, that there are more converts from the Bible Belt to Islam.
Sultan, the message is good, but the obvious bigotry dilutes your otherwise excellent post.
ReplyDeleteI know you're not racist, but one could misconstrue your focusing on Obama's grandmother, whom he never knew and was never anti Israel, nor even a practicing Muslim.
Obama's grandmother who did influence him was from his mothers side, and she was a white Christian. A commie if I recall, and they're anti Israel.
Christians in the USA are more influential in rabble rousing against Israel than any Muslim like Obama's grandmother.
Again I know you're not racist, but the message could be misconstrued to mean that you are. Aside from the fact that you concentrated on a dubious Muslim link from a grandmother he didn't know, to another one (Anne's mother, a white Christian) who was anti Israel, whom he did know.
I agree with your sentiment, although I am not Jewish and some of your analogies are lost on me. But I fear you might as profitably address a brick wall as this administration, though. The new pharaoh has seen which side of the bread is buttered, and has chosen sides. All his moral pontifications are nothing more than absolute hypocrisy, but Israel has offered itself as a convenient punching bag. C'est la vie.
ReplyDelete"Christians in the USA are more influential in rabble rousing against Israel than any Muslim" Yanis
ReplyDeleteAs evangelical protestant Christians are the very strongest of Israel's supporters...I'm a bit puzzled as to exactly what you mean, could you elaborate?
Goeffrey Britain,
ReplyDeleteEvangelical Christians may be the biggest supporters of Israel, but they have no influence in foreign policy or even as religious group. I'd even say they're the least influential group even though they are one of the biggest. Even during the Bush years, they could not influence either foreign policy nor internal politics and certainly did not do anything for Israel that was of long term benefit.
For this reason, they alienate the mainline Church supporters, they also have fomented anti Israel sentiment amongst the more influential Christian denominations, and that helps fuel anti Semitism.
Moreover, as far as Israel is concerned, the support from Evangelicals comes with strings attached in that their financial support seems mainly to be
about funding Messianic movements to proselytise.
Does the support translate into any benefits? If so, please enlighten me.
A thousand words of support are meaningless if they cannot overcome or influence anyone that matters.
Christians are not a single group. Nor are Jews. Nor are evangelical Christians or orthodox Jews or any other denomination.
ReplyDeleteThat said the practical influence of evangelical Christians on foreign policy is minimal, but that can be seen in a failure to defend Christians in Africa as well.
Yes I agree Sultan, but that could be because African Christians are Catholic. Evangelicals do not go out of their way to speak out for other Christians like the mainline Protestant or Catholic denominations of Christians worldwide. In fact Israel supporting Evangelicals are the ones who foment a lot of Anti Israel sentiment amongst the other Christians because they believe all other Christians are heretics. Recall Pastor Hagee and the "great whore" (Catholic) incident.
ReplyDeleteWhat are your thoughts on the Christians who want to become settlers and convert to Judaism so they can move to Israel and join the IDF? It's supported by a lot of Pro Israel Baptist churches.
Thank you for this article. I appreciate it very much.
ReplyDeleteYanis, you might be interested in the material on Jewish Israel
ReplyDeletehttp://jewishisrael.com/
It's the best source I know of which investigates the relationship between certain evangelical groups in Israel. They focus on missionary activity but that's just the tip of the iceberg.
You'll find the information on Jewish Israel very informative.
Sultan Knish,
ReplyDeleteAfter repeated misuse of Israel's hospitality to the American administration to condemn Israel's internal affairs, now is the time for an indefinite moratorium on US official visitors. It is also time to stop the addiction to US aid. It harms far more than it helps.
Kelia thanks, thats a great site. Jewish Israel should be propogated far and wide.
ReplyDeleteOne of the reasons Evangelicals are condemning the Jewish left in the USA, is because they recognise this agenda. They want support for their religious agenda. America may be conservative, but it was never Christian. There has always been a separation of state and religion, and that's the way it will remain.
I recently got into a heated discussion about Jewish construction within the so-called 'occupied' areas, arguing with someone who was avowedly anti-Israel. He claimed that these settlements were illegal and were taking over Palestinian lands because the Jewish people had never lived there -- or, at least, had not lived there 'for thousands of years.' I know this to be false, but my knowledge of middle eastern history is imprecise, so I could not counter with specifics about an ongoing Jewish presence there. Can you refer me to a good book that might provide an outline or perhaps give me a few facts to remember for the next time I encounter such an argument?
ReplyDeletePost a Comment