B"H
- These last two parashot, Terumah & Tetzaveh, depressed me. Not only we don't have the Temple, on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, not only we lost the Ark and all the furnishings in there, not only we don't have a Kohen Gadol in his vestments performing his duty in there, we have today Jews who openly say and declare that they are not interested in animal sacrifices. That Judaism, as they say, passed that stage.
So, the fundamental question remains: What shall Jews DO today to enhance redemption, to be G-d's nation, with other words to show the world G-d's handiwork?
The answer maybe too complex to put it down in a few lines in a forum like this one, as the Torah is too complex for this. However Ki Sisa, this week's parsha that talks about the Golden Calf, may give us a clue.
I see the Golden Calf as not just a temporary object, but as a system. In the absence of Moshe, it reverses the natural flow of authority for the Jewish people, from G.d-to-the-people to from-the-people-to-idol-worship. After the mishap, in fact, "Aaron said: "Let not my master's anger flair up. You know that the people is disposed toward evil." (Exodus 32:22)
Today, we are in the same situation. We don't have our Temple and we didn't establish our own institutions in the Land as we should have. We don't have Moshe either. What we have today is an alien system, "democracy", that we learned from the goyim and that we bought back with us from the exile here, to the Land of Isral. Let's not forget what democracy is. It's "people's power", demos meaning "people" and "cratos" power. In Greek, which is the language of Greece, Hellas in Greek, and so of the Hellenists, per definition.
So it seems obvious to me that the quickest, most direct way to bring about redemption open for us today is to refuse to dance around the modern Golden Calf State: Let's reduce to the minimum our collaboration with it, and most importantly, let's stop voting for it. We voted for Hashem, remember, in the Sinai, under the Mount, for all generations.
Shabbat shalom!
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