Bezalel

Beyond Words

Selected Writings of Rabbi Meir Kahane,

1960-1990

Volume 3   1977-1981

 Dvar Torah: Bezalel

“Behold, I have called by name (b’shem) Bezalel the son of Uri, the son of Hur…” (Exodus 31:2)

The All Mighty chooses Bezalel to be the architect and the builder of the first temple of G-d, the Sanctuary in the desert.  In a sense, the Sanctuary had a holiness that neither of the two Temples in Jerusalem had.  For while in the case of the latter two, the vessels were captured by the destroyers  (and in the case of the second one, the vessels were not even there to begin with), the vessels of the Sanctuary were not allowed by the All Mighty to fall into the hands of the gentiles.  And so, we ask:  Why was it Bezalel who was especially chosen for the great honor of building this holy sanctuary? 

Secondly, what does the phrase “Behold I have called by name” (b’shem) mean?

Thirdly, why does the Torah bother to give the name of both the father and the grandfather of Bezalel?  Rarely do we find the name of a grandfather given EVERY time that someone is mentioned.  Why bother to mention Hur’s name?

It appears to me that the answer to these questions holds deep truths.  To begin with, let us see who Hur was.  We first find him in the chapter dealing with the famous battle of Amalek (Exodus 17).  It is he and Aaron who holds the hands of Moses as he holds them high – the hands that symbolize the faith and trust in

G-d.  And so, Hur becomes associated with the man of faith.  But there is more, for if that is all, why is not one of Aaron’s descendants chosen to build the Sanctuary?  The answer is that Hur is a man of faith – and more.  He is one who proves it by reaching its zenith – Kiddush Hashem.

As the Jews throw off the yoke of the All Mighty and make for themselves a golden calf, it is one man who stands up to protest.  Aaron attempts to gain time by portraying himself a one who goes along with the people in the hope that as he delays, Moses will return.  He is a man who has faith and will never, himself, worship anyone but the All Mighty, but he does not stand up to protest!  One man does that: Hur.  Our Rabbis tell us that it is Hur who rises up to shout that this is wrong, and he is killed by the Jews (Vayikra Rabbah 10:3)  Hur reaches the zenith of faith – Kiddush Hashem.  It is easy enough to say that one believes and has faith.  The ultimate proof of it is that one is prepared to endanger himself for Torah and perhaps even lose his life.  That is the essence of faith.  That is Hur, the grandfather of Bezalel.

And who was his father?  The Rabbis tell us that it was Caleb, the very same Caleb who, along with Joshua, was one of the two dissenting spies.   While the other ten, in fear and lack of faith, spoke of the dangers in Canaan and the impossibility of defeating the enemies there, it is Caleb and Joshua who stand up and say:  No, we can defeat the enemy, no matter how strong.  Let us have faith in the All Mighty.

Again, two men of faith, but again, one of them takes that faith to its ultimate test.  For the Torah singes out Caleb:  “For My servant Caleb, because he had another spirit within him and has filled himself with faith after Me…” [“va’yemale acharai”] (Numbers 14:24).  Why is Caleb singled out over Joshua?  Because while both were men of faith, it was Caleb who rose to publicly protest the majority opinion: “And Caleb stilled the people … and said: Let us go up …” (ibid., 13:30).  It was Caleb who stood up before the raging mob and who endangered himself, who was prepared to give up his life, if necessary, for faith in G-d.  H reached the peak of that faith.

And that is why Bezalel, grandson and great-grandson of the men who reached the peak of faith, is chosen to build the Holy Sanctuary.  Because of the merit of his ancestors.  In return for Caleb’s being filled with another spirit, G-d says, concerning Bezalel:  “And I shall fill him with the spirit of G-d”  (Exodus 31:3).  In return for the fact that Bezalel’s ancestors called G-d by name, sanctified His name, the All Mighty says: “Behold, I have called Bezalel by name.”  Indeed, in the manner that a man measures things, thus is he himself measured.

It is Kiddush Hashem, the willingness to give of oneself in order to sanctify and magnify the glory of the All Mighty, that is the touchstone of Judaism.  Our failure to understand that, our failure to take risks and to “endanger” ourselves, is the clearest proof of the shallowness of our so-called faith.  We shall merit building the new sanctuary on that day when we become the descendants of a Bezalel, a Hur and a Caleb.

Written on April 1978

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Moses Speaks To Paraoh - "No Retreat No Compromise"

K A H A NE 

The magazine of the authentic Jewish Idea
Shavat –5737 February – 1977
DIVREI TORAH

 "Moses Speaks To Paraoh" "No Retreat No Compromise "

“And Pharaoh called to Moses, saying: Go and worship the L-rd. Only your sheep and cattle will remain – your children will also go with you. And Moses said: You will also give us offerings and sacrifices for the L-rd our G-d, and our flocks will go with us…” (Shmot 10:24-26)

The ninth plague-darkness – has struck Egypt with a vengeance and Pharaoh breaks. Step by step he has retreated and after the eighth plague – locusts – he was prepared to allow the Jews to leave except for their children. Now he surrenders almost entirely as he agrees that all the Jews can leave. He only asks one thing, one compromise, one small victory for himself, that the Jewish cattle remain behind.

Consider; the Jews have been slaves for 210 years. They have lived in misery and persecution. They suffered decrees such as the one casting their male children into the sea. They cried out unto the L-rd for freedom and salvation. Now, apparently the great moment has arrived! Pharaoh agrees that they shall go free! What does it matter that he asks for their cattle? Give it to him! The main thing is peace and salvation and we are willing to give up cattle for peace!

But Moses knows that this is not the purpose of the freedom of the Jewish people and of the story of the slavery and exodus. He is not prepared to compromise one inch because he knows what the purpose of G-d is. When Moses first entered the presence of Pharaoh and said: “The L-rd, G-d of the Hebrews, has said: Let my people go!” Pharaoh contemptuously answered: “Who is the L-rd? I know not the L-rd and will not let Israel go!” Here is where the battle was joined. Here is the purpose and aim of creation – to have the world recognize the dominion and kingship of the L-rd being challenged. Pharaoh must be made to recognize and totally acknowledge the sovereignty of the L-rd over him and his people. He cannot make compromises; he cannot strike bargains. He must submit totally!

“And I shall be glorified through (the defeat of) Pharaoh and his army and Egypt shall know that I am the L-rd.” Only the total defeat of the wicked can raise and honor the name of the L-rd, says the Biblical commentator Rashi. This is why there will be no compromise with Pharaoh. He must totally submit, he must totally surrender.

And even when he apparently does this, after the plague of the first born, when he runs to Moses and says: “Get out, take your flocks with you, just leave and ask the L-rd to bless me!” Moses refuses and in the words of the Mechilta; “And he called unto Moses and Aaron in the middle of the night and said: get up and leave! Said Moses unto him: No, we have been ordered not to leave our houses until morning. What are we, thieves that we should slink out in the night? No, we will leave only in the morning with an upraised arm before the eyes of all the Egyptians!”

Not one inch of retreat here. The lesson of the L-rd being the Omnipotent, King of the universe must be seen and acknowledged.

The lesson is an eternal one and must be learned in our time, too. The question of peace in the Middle East is a question of the Arabs and the world acknowledging the total sovereignty of the All Mighty. There can be no compromise on this. It is only a peace that comes with Arabs submitting to the yoke of the heavenly kingdom that will be a permanent one and the Jew who gives up part of his land as a compromise, violates the entire purpose of the rise of the Jewish State and the demand of the All Mighty that the nations acknowledge Him as King. There can be no retreat from land because that is in essence a retreat also from the Kingship of the L-rd.

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What Is It All About?

 K A H A N E

The magazine of the authentic Jewish Idea

Cheshvan 5737 – November 1976

(This article was written when Rabbi Kahane was incarcerated Federal Prison, Manhattan, May 7, 1975)

What Is It All About?

The problems of Israel are many; that us a thing that is hardly new to the Jewish people.  What is new is that for the first time in 20 centuries, Jewish leaders have not the slightest concept of why these problems exist and what the only solutions are.  They are totally and absolutely off the track; their frame of reference is completely wrong!  They have not the slightest understanding of the historical process that is taking place; they are intellectual goyim of the first class; they wander about hopelessly lost, with no sense of direction and not the foggiest notion of what the Jewish crises today is all about.

Their plans, their programs and their ‘solutions’ are impotent and irrelevant and, above all, tragic because they bring down with them the Jewish people.  Once cannot find answers if he does not understand the questions; one cannot find solutions unless he perceives the problems.  One cannot understand the Jewish destiny if he is, intellectually, a gentile.

All that is happening today – the problems afflicting the Jew in Israel and the problems that envelope the Jew in the Exile – all these are one.  It is time that we understood what it is all about.

When Moses first entered the palace of Pharaoh and said to him: “Thus saith the L-rd, the G-d of Israel; Let my people go…” the Egyptian monarch, supreme ruler of his land and of the greatest empire of its time replied:

“Who is the L-rd that I should hearken unto His voice to let Israel go?  I know not the L-rd…”

The course of human history has been that of G-d’s effort to make man “know the L-rd.”  The purpose of man is to rise to holiness through the bending and subjugating of his will, his ego and his self to the L-rd.  Man, the animal, becomes man the creature “a little lower than the angels” only through humbly making his will subordinate to his Maker.  The knowing of G-d, the recognition that there is a G-d and that he is the L-rd, the G-d of Israel, is the first step to the smashing of one’s ego with all its ugly and sordid selfishness and its obsession with self and self-gratification.  To be free, and to do “one’s thing” and to cast off restraint is not to know G-d but to place oneself on a divine pedestal from which one can be worshipped.

To know G-d and to know specifically the L-rd, the G-d of Israel, is the way – the only way – to create a human race which is humble and small, holy and good.  It is the only way to understand the concepts that comprise holiness, the ultimate goal of man. It is the only way to understand the methods that lead to the attainment of that holiness which will put an end to the self-centeredness from which stem all the evils of the world.

The Jewish people is the instrument of G-d, chosen by Him to teach the world to “know the L-rd.”  It is the Jews who were directed to practice the theory of holiness, to bring into reality the Man that is just “a little lower than the angels.”  Jewish history begins with the election of the Jew, with his selection as the Chosen People.  Jewish history is the story of the success and failures of the Jew in his mission, and the rewards and punishments of G-d.  It is a history that is filled with the tragedy of both gentile and Jew seeking to escape from the yoke of heaven, denying the existence of the authority of the L-rd, stating: “I know not the L-rd…” and choosing self-gratification over humble holiness, with all the selfish and sordid evils that stems from this.

The end of this historical trek is told a thousand times over in the Bible and the Talmud.  The end of days will see the earth “filled with the knowledge of the L-rd.”  The ultimate future will be one of, “on that day, the L-rd will be One, and His name One.”  The destiny of man is to ultimately know the L-rd, G-d of Israel, as the Omniscient and Omnipotent, and conversely to know himself – at long last – as the created, the finite, the humble being who stands eternally at the mercy of His Maker.  How that will come about is dependent on the Jew understanding his historical and immutable destiny   

“I am the L-rd, in its time will I hurry it (the redemption).”  The words of 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.” (Sanhedrin 98).

The final redemption can come in one of two ways.  Either through the Jew meriting it and acknowledging the L-rd, shouting out “I know the L-rd” and “I accept His will and His commandments,” or refusing to.  In the case of the former, redemption will come swiftly and with majesty and G-d will show His truth and reality and Omnipotence before the world as He brings awesome and speedy victory for His people Israel, a victory that will lead the nations of the world to acknowledge and “know” him and His sovereignty.  In the case of the latter, of the refusal to bow to G-d; in the case where the Jew will not merit redemption, that redemption will, nevertheless, come but not before the wrath of G-d will bring tragedy and disaster upon the Jewish people – terribly and needlessly.  The moment of truth and the time of choice are at hand.  The final era is upon us.

The end of days, the era of final redemption, shows its signs all about us in our time.  What is happening today is part of a Divine plan, part of a directed destiny.  The Jew has entered the period of atchalta d’geulah, the beginning of the final redemption.   It is an era that has seen great prophecies begun to be fulfilled.  The terrible holocaust, the incredible resurrection of a Jewish State, the breathtaking return of Jews from the four corners of the earth, the awesome military victories and liberation of Jewish lands, east, north and south.  These mark the determination of the All Mighty to make His name known and His power felt and His truth evident.

The Jew must understand that everything that is happening today is part of the Divine decree.  Everything!

The crises for Israel and the Jewish people,  the worsening situation in the world, the turmoil among the nations, the  ascendancy of the forces of aggression and despotism, the movement of the brink of nuclear warfare, all these are coming  to make a mockery of the plans and certainties of man.  All that he proposes begins to crumble as the One whom he refuses to “know”, ultimately disposes.

The Jew must “know the L-rd” and know what the L-rd demands of him in these days. We have an America committed to the Roger Plan and UN Security Council Resolution 242 to force Israel to give up all the liberated lands; a Lebanon which will be free of PLO pressure only because it has become a Syrian protectorate, which is a far greater menace to Israel than the PLO could ever be .  An Israel which sees its own people split on the issues of foreign policy and which knows that American Jewry – fearful of the fallout from anti-Semitism in the event of an Israeli-Washington clash – will pressure the Jewish state to make concessions; and Israel with a growing problem of Arab rioting and bloodshed in the liberated lands and demonstrations against the state by Israeli Arabs which will bring Israel to the brink of a Northern Ireland; and Israel in grave danger. 

Reality is the Exile growing ever more untenable – a graveyard for Jewish hopes, Jewish souls, Jewish bodies.  Assimilation and alienation rage even as the Jew sups noisily from the fleshpots of Galut.  And overhead, the skies darken and cloud grows bleaker as the threat of physical anti-Semitism becomes more real with every passing day. Whole communities face the threat of elimination; Rhodesia, South Africa, Argentina.  They are the next dominoes in the inevitable and immutable process of the liquidation of the Exile and MUST be because it is ordained in the Book of the Righteous.  And America?  Bicentennial or not the Jew will not escape the fate of the others.  This is the reality.

But how swift is the possibility of redemption!  How near it is to us and we need only touch it, open the door for it.  It seeks to embrace us.  As a bride seeking her lover so does salvation seek the Jew who need only give her the dowry, the dowry that shall bring salvation.  That dowry?  The payment?  Faith, “And thou shalt be betrothed unto me with faith, and thou shalt know the L-rd.”  Faith.  Such as simple thing, such a difficult thing.  Real faith; the one that demands of us courage and strength and the ability to throw off our fear of man to do the bidding of the

L-rd.

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ALONE 1989

Beyond Words

Selected Writings of Rabbi Meir Kahane,

1960-1990

Volume 6

“Beyond Words” is a newly-published seven volume collection of Rabbi Meir Kahane’s writings  from 1960 – 1990 that originally appeared in The Jewish Press, other serial publications, and his privately-published works.

“Beyond Words” also includes a number of extra features:

Chronology of Rabbi Kahane's life.

 “Beyond Words” now can be bought at Amazon.com.  On the search line, type…  Beyond Words Kahane.

 ALONE

The United States decision to speak with the Palestinian Liberation Organization, a thing that in effect means recognition of the terrorists as the party that Washington looks to as the representative of the “Palestinian people,” is a thing that should shock no one.  And yet it does.

It shocks and angers Yitzhak Shamir and Shimon Peres coalitionally and it shocks the twins Moshe Arens and Yitzhak Rabin and it shocks American Jewish leaders.  It should not, and the fact that it doesn’t speaks volumes for the impotence and lack of Jewishness of those who are the leaders (G-d help us!) of the Jewish state and people.

The Arab-Jewish ongoing struggle must, of necessity, become a thing of which the United States public and Administration will either grow weary or, seeing it as a threat to their own interests, will take steps to attempt to end it.  The “Palestinian” uprising is only the latest in a series of events that have moved both Washington and the American public to a more hostile attitude toward Israeli policies (or to be more exact, its total lack of any policy).  Indeed, the truth is that the history of U.S.–Israel relations is far less strewn with roses than the Arab lobby in the United States would have people believe.

From its inception, indeed even before that, the United States placed immense difficulties in the path of a new Jewish state.  American withdrawal of support for the United Nations Partition Plan in April 1948 was followed by an embargo on all weapons to the Middle East, which hurt only the Jews.  U. S. Secretary of State George Marshall warned the future first Foreign Minister of Israel, Moshe Shertok (Sharett), not to declare a Jewish state, since the U.S. would not help save it from the Arab armies.  President Eisenhower, in 1956, compelled Israel to give up the Sinai and Gaza to Nasser and brutally threatened to prevent money from the UJA and Israel Bonds from reaching the Jewish state.  Not a bullet was sold to Israel by the United States until the early 1960s, and in the crucial weeks before the Six-Day war of 1967, as Israel’s fate hung in the balance, the United States refused to implement its promise of support made by Eisenhower, in the event that Egypt again closed the Suez Canal to Israeli shipping and blocked the Gulf of Eliat.  It was fear of United States reaction that moved Golda Meir and Moshe Dayan to make the criminal step of allowing Egypt and Syria to strike the first blow in the Yom Kippur War and thus doom 4,000 Jewish soldiers to die.  And it was the United States that prevented the Israelis from destroying Egyptian power, their Third Army, when Israel had them surrounded. 

This American policy of snatching the fruits of victory from Israel continued in the Lebanese war, as the golden opportunity to physically liquidate the terrorists and their leaders in Beirut was frustrated by Ronald Regan’s pressure.  Since then, the United States has condemned Israel regularly over the intifada, and Secretary of State Shultz, a man with a reputation as a friend of Israel, exerted enormous pressure on the Israelis to agree to a disastrous International Peace Conference.  And now, of course, recognition of the PLO.

So let there be no surprise.  It will get worse, and there is nothing the secularists of the Hellenist State of Israel can do about it, except.  Except weep and wail and protest and capitulate.  Or understand what being Jewish is; what the miracle of the rise of a Jewish state is; what faith in the G-d of Israel is.

To be alone is the destiny of the Jew ever since it was decreed, “Lo, it is a people that shall dwell alone” (Numbers 23:9)  For to be alone is to do two things.  One, it is to create a separate Jewish society and state, free of the influences of the gentile culture and abominations.  Two, it is to manifest in the most graphic way possible the total faith in the

G-d of Israel that is the foundation of the Jewish people and of Torah itself.  Indeed, the final redemption of the Jewish people cannot come as long as the Jew has even one ally upon whom he leans.  And that is why, whether the Jew approves of not, the All Mighty will guarantee that there will be no ally, that Israel will be isolated.

For as long as the Jew has even one ally, he will always convince himself that his salvation was due to that gentile.  A secularized people that has lost its moorings, its anchor of Judaism, has lost, too the ability to even conceive of life in a way that transcends what it calls “logic” and “practicality” and “reality.”  It will always cast its bread upon the waters of the gentile ally, and it is only when they are so soggy that they sink, and the Jew is left starving, that there exists even the remotest possibility of his returning to the one and only hope – the G-d of Israel.

And so Israel slides towards isolation.  Not the isolation that G-d demands, the deliberate move of the Jew towards separation and isolation and trust in the All Mighty.  But the forced isolation of nations moving away from Israel either through support of its enemies or by taking an “even-handed” stance.  The ally, American is becoming much less than that today, and tomorrow it will be worse.

But say not “worse,” because in Jewish terms it is better. Best. Salvation and redemption for the Jew will come only when he is isolated and alone with his G-d.  It will be whether the Jew likes it or not.

Written January 1989

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