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FORTY YEARS
Rabbi Meir Kahane 1983
Forward to the Second Edition
It was in 1982 that I wrote this
book, “FORTY YEARS”. In the seven years
that have passed, the words I wrote and the thoughts I put down here have only
been sadly affirmed. The tragedy, the
awful national tragedy and catastrophe I wrote about and that need not
be, comes closer and closer. And
my people see nothing and hear nothing.
There are those who, in their tragic ignorance of Judaism and Jewish
destiny, simply do not understand what they see and what they ear. And there are those who do not wish
to see and do not wish to hear.
And so it comes closer.
My people, my poor people…
More than 2500 years ago, the
Prophet Ezekiel spoke, in the name of G-d, to the people of Israel, saying: “If
I shall bring upon the land a sword – the inhabitants shall take a man from
amongst them, and they shall appoint him a tzofe, a watchman for
them. And when he seeth the sword come
upon the land he shall blow the shofar and warn the people.” (Ezekiel 33)
The tzofe
the watchman. Appointed to see the sword
come upon the people of Israel and cry out; to blow the shofar and warn
his people! That is the role of every
Jew who can see and hear and understand – and who loves his people. To cry out, to sound the shofar, to warn
them!
That is
why this book was written. It is the
nation shofar of our times.
One will hear it’s warning by reading it, by studying it, by taking it
to heart. May the Almighty give us the
wisdom to understand and the courage to act on that understanding. For the forty years of which I speak, have
passed.
And the
days of Judgment are here.
26
Tevet 5749 - 3 January 1989
Meir Kahane
An Introduction
It
is seven years since I wrote the manuscript, FORTY YEARS, and with the
passing of the 40 years of which I speak in the book, with the Jewish State now
past its fortieth year, the terrible realities of which I wrote hem, become
starkly clear. Terrible visions become
awful realization. The Jewish State
crumbles and shakes and shudders before our eyes as the gentile enemies gather
strength and momentum and the Jew stands astonishingly impotent and paralyzed –
at best – and deeply divided by defeatism, abnormal guilt and suicidal
tendencies from within. The dream of
centuries becomes a nightmare; the hope that was never lost becomes a thing to
be questioned, doubted, attacked.
But, of
course, it could never be anything else.
The fate of the Jew, despite the foolish arrogance of the secularists
and the unfathomable loss of the way of apparently religious Jews, has always
been based upon the iron law of Divine determination: “If you shall walk in My statutes and keep
My commandments … I will give you peace in the land and you shall lie down and
none shall make you afraid… But if you will not hearken unto Me and will not do
all these commandments, and if your soul abhor My ordinances so that you will
not do all My commandments but break my covenant…I will set My face against you
and you shall be smitten before your enemies; they that hate you shall rule
over you and you shall flee when none pursueth you.” (Leviticus 26)
FORTY YEARS
The idea first entered my head as I
sat, one day, in Ramle Prison. It was the eve of Tisha B”AV, the tragic
commemoration of the destruction of both Temples, the beginning of both
terrible exiles. I sat, reviewing the
book of Jonah, with its message of repentance, on the day of national
tragedy. Jonah enters the city of
Nineveh, to which he has been sent by the Almighty, to warn them of impending
destruction unless they repent. And as I
read, the words of Jonah to the people suddenly leaped out at me: “In forty years, Nineveh shall be
overturned!”
Forty. The thought suddenly struck me: How many times, again and again, does that
number arise in connection with sin and punishment? “And the rain was on the earth forty days
and forty nights.” (Genesis 7:12), the punishment of a world flooded for it
s sin. Forty. And centuries later, as the Jews of the
desert “despised the pleasant land” and wept over their “home” in Egypt, the
Almighty angrily decreed that the generation of the desert would not enter the
Holy Land saying: “And your children will wander in the wilderness forty
years and bear your faithlessness.” (Numbers 14:33). Again, forty. And the punishment of stripes, whipping, is
one of “forty shall he strike him, he shall not increase”, and the
atonement for sin and the purification process begin with a study of Torah
given forty days at Sinai, continuing in a mikva, ritualarium, whose
water must be a minimum of forty S’ah.
Forty. Again and again, the number forty
connected to sin and punishment. Why
forty? I do not know except to quote
the rabbis in Bamidbar Rabah 5:5:
“And why does the Torah obligate forty stripes?
For he (the sinner) violated a Torah given in forty days and brought
death unto himself (man) who was created in forty days. Let him therefore, be whipped forty times and
be relieved of his punishment, as was done to Adam who sinned, was deserving of
death, and was punished with forty. For
the world was cursed, due to his sin, forty curses: ten for Adam, ten for Eve, ten for the
serpent and ten for the land.”
And
in that tiny cell in prison the thought expanded. Not only was the concept “forty” tied
to sin and punishment, it was specifically connected to the warning of G-d
to the sinner, a warning designed to avert that punishment. Jonah warns Nineveh of impending punishment
and this gives them a grace period of forty days during which they might
search their souls and change their ways.
In the case of both Holy Temples,
the Almighty gave the Jewish people a period
of forty years
of grace; time to think and rethink their ways.
Time to return to Him
and save
themselves from that punishment. In the
awful final days of the first Jewish
State, the L-rd
tells the prophet Ezekiel: “And thou shall lie again on your right
side and bear
the iniquity of the House of Judah, forty days; each day for a year,
each day for a
year.”(Ezekiel 4:6)
And the Biblical commentator
Rashi declares: “We learn that the time of the
exiling of the
ten tribes until the destruction of Jerusalem there was a period of forty
years.” Forty years: The Almighty, having brought down His wrath
on the ten tribes of
Israel, begins the countdown to the terrible
day of punishment that is decreed for a
House of Judah that has turned its back on its
G-d. But one final opportunity is given
them, a grace
period. A grace period of forty
years. And so a prophet is chosen, a
prophet of grace, of final warning –
Jeremiah. And in the words of the
rabbis: “The
book of Lamentations was more effective for
Israel than the forty years that Jeremiah
prophesied unto them” (Eichah Rabah 4:27)
And
the Second Temple “Forty years prior to the destruction of the Temple,
the lot (for the Yom Kippur sacrifice) never was chosen by the High Priest’s
right hand; and the red slip outside the Holy of Holies never turned white (as
a sign of divine forgiveness) and the western candle would not light and the
doors of the Sanctuary opened by themselves until Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai
admonished them, saying: “Sanctuary, sanctuary…I know that you are destined to
be destroyed…(Yuma 39b).
And again:
“For forty years did Rabbi Zadok sit and fast in the hope that Jerusalem
not be destroyed.” (Gittin56a)
And again:
“For forty years prior to the destruction of the Temple, the Sanhedrin
exiled itself (from the Temple) and sat in the market place.” (Avoda Zara 8b)
Once again,
the period of grace. Forty years. The final hope of the Almighty that, perhaps,
His final warning would be heeded. The
countdown of forty years, the last chance.
And it was then that the full impact of the thought
stuck me: if it is true that in the
first Jewish state and in the second, the Almighty granted us a grace period of
forty years – is it possible that the same could be true with the third state? Our state – the State of Israel?
The thought
has become an ongoing one; call it obsessive, if you will. After all, the final redemption is one that
our rabbis have explained as coming in one of two ways – and there is no third. “In its time, I will hurry it (the
Redemption).” (Isaiah 60). And the
rabbis explain: “If they, the Jews,
merit it I will hurry it. If they do not
merit it, it will come in its time”.
The
difference is more than chronological It is a qualitative difference that goes
to the very essence of our existence. A
“hurried redemption is one that comes with majestic glory and free of pain and
tragedy. But one that is “in its time”,
by the very fact that it comes despite our unworthiness, is accompanied by
terrible destruction and holocaust as the deserved punishment that precedes the
final glory and salvation. How important
it is for us to avoid this awful and needless suffering! And how convinced I am that the Almighty
pleads with us to do just that; to replace a redemption “in its time” with one
that is “hurried”; to search our ways and return to Him And how convinced I am that just as in the
past He has given us a period of grace, so, too today we have been granted it.
And it
becomes clearer and clearer to me that, once again, it is forty years; forty
years of warning, admonition, opportunity.
The final chance.
The
State of Israel, that most incredible of miracles, marked the beginning of the
final redemption, a redemption born – not out of the betrothal of Jew to his
Maker through faith and return – but rather out of the wedlock of Holocaust
that was the depths of desecration of the name of G-d, the Hillul Ha’Shem
that was mockery, humiliation, and denial of the prowess or very existence of
the G-d of Israel. It was that Holocaust
which broke the patience of a G-d of Israel who watched His name mocked and
dragged in the gentile dust for 20 centuries. “Not for your sake do I do this, O House of
Israel, but rather for My Holy Name that you desecrated by the very fact of
being among the nations.” (Ezekiel 36).
And
so, a Jewish State rose from the crematoria and ashes, not because we deserved
it, but because the gentile did. Because
the punishment and awesome wrath of G-d were being prepared for a world that
had mocked and humiliated the name of the
L-rd, G-d of Israel.
The State
of Israel, which rose up in the year 1948, I am convinced, is the beginning,
not only of the redemption, but also of the grace period granted us. In the very marrow of my bones, I feel that
the Almighty, in His infinite mercy and goodness, gives us the final beseeching
opportunity to turn needless suffering into glorious and instant redemption.
Forty
years. The number may not be exact; it may be a few more, a few less,
but the period is clear. Forty years of
warning, of heartfelt cry from our Father in Heaven. Forty years of grace, of a last
opportunity to reverse needles disaster, to bring the redemption with grandeur
and majesty
For make no
mistake. The magnificent miracle of
return and rise of a Jewish State is surely the beginning of the Final
Redemption, but hardly the end. The true
finality, the magnificent era of the Messiah, comes to fruition gloriously and
majestically and breathtakingly only if we cleave to the great axiom “If you
walk in My statutes…I will give peace in the land.” (Leviticus 26)
This is the
immutable law of the People of Israel. There
is no escaping it. What will be with the Jew; whether his future will be
bright or black; whether he will enjoy peace or horrors, depends only on his
cleaving to his role, obligation and mission in this world, upon his bending
his neck and will beneath the yoke of Heaven.
“If you
walk in My statues… I will give you peace…
But if you will not hearken unto Me… I will appoint terror over you.”
(ibid.).
This is the choice; the only
choice. All the rest is nonsense. And time ticks away and the decision is in
our hands.
Dear Jew, the Almighty gives us
this day life or death. Will be choose
life?
My people; my dear and foolish
people! We speak of your life and that
of your seed, your children and grandchildren.
Choose wisely! Choose life! The magnificence is yours for the
asking. The horror will be yours for the
blindness. Choose life, but quickly;
there is little time left. The forty
years ticks away.
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