The Prophet Abraham and 75 Years of Israel's Independence
From yesterday evening through this evening today we recognize the Jewish state's diamond anniversary of its creation.
Click here to check out the first 30 Installments - Volume I - in this series on Antisemitism and Culture. The top 5 most important pieces from this first wave:
What It Means When the Leader of the Republican Party Dines With THREE Antisemites
7 Reasons This Christian Hippie Became a Zealot Against Jew Hatred
This is the 23rd installment in Volume II, intended as another 30 pieces exploring the many manifestations of Jew Hatred and the issues surrounding it in America and globally. See the 22 previous installments listed at the end of this article.
“Politics is downstream from culture,” the late Andrew Breitbart popularized among conservative bloggers while he was alive. I’d go a step further: Everything is downstream from culture. The cultures you embrace determine who you are and who you become. You become what you worship.
Yesterday
offered his useful thoughtful commentary on the goings-on in Israel and noted the country’s 75th independence day anniversay:
This milestone for the Jewish state has also been on my mind lately, as I’ve been drafting a bunch of briefs for Jewish News Syndicate on the subject. Such as this one which contained a fact I found interesting enough to include:
Christian Zionists applaud Israel’s 75th anniversary
Mat Staver, the group’s chairman, noted that Abraham was 75—the same age Israel is today—when God promised to make him a great nation and showed him the land that his descendants would inherit, present-day Israel.
Here’s the full quote from Staver:
Christians in Defense of Israel Chairman Mat Staver said, “We celebrate the 75th anniversary of the nation of Israel. Out of the ashes of the Holocaust a nation was born in one day. The number 75 has biblical significance, for Abraham was 75 years old when God promised to make him into a great nation and showed Abraham the land in which he and his descendants would inherit – the land in which Israel now thrives. The biblical and historical connection of the land of Israel to the Jewish people is undisputed. It is miraculous that this small country has not just survived but thrived and contributes great agricultural and technological advances to the world. Israel not only has survived against all odds, but it thrives. Israel is nothing short of a modern miracle.”
Now, I usually don’t like to make too much of “Biblical numerology” type concepts - it bugs me when more fundamentalist Christians take them way too seriously - but here I’ll make an exception.
This idea that Abraham at age 75 became a prophetic leader, laying the foundation for a new nation of people, and that a similar concept might apply to the nation of Israel on its 75th birthday seems perfectly reasonable to me. There’s nothing superstitious or mystical about the idea - it’s entirely practical. It takes significant time to learn the lessons of life and become one who can lead others in response to them.
And in a way that’s how I see Israel and one of the reasons I’ve shifted from conservatism to Zionism as my primary ideological model these days. To me “Zionism” means more than just opposing antisemitism and supporting Israel’s efforts to defend itself. I boiled down Zionism to what I regard as its most basic definition here:
However there’s a more complex layer to it today: Zionism to me doesn’t just mean defending the Jewish people and the Jewish state, it means learning the lessons and insights from both and applying them to our own lives and our own nation.
What in particular do I think we can most learn from Israel? What it means to be a nation perpetually under attack and constantly needing to develop new strategies to defend itself. We as Americans have often grown too complacent and comfortable. Too many think that the world and humanity at large have evolved and grown civilized. To which I say, in the spirit of
's post at today:
War and cruelty remain humanity’s default settings and we have to look more broadly around the world to see it clearly. What Israel has been experiencing for the last 75 years - a continuation of the genocidal antisemitic efforts to wipe out the Jewish people - is evidence of it. And how to oppose and defeat such evils is something we can learn from our Israeli allies.
See the previous installments in volume II of this series:
Martin Luther King, Jr: An American Hero and Courageous Zionist Voice
Talking to These Students Gave Me Hope in this Dark, Dark World of War and Hate
Why I Don't Expect the Palestinians Will *Ever* Make Peace with Israel and Thus Gain Statehood
The Antisemitism of Ron Paul's Far Right Anarcho-Capitalist Ideological Cult
When Holocaust Trivialization Manifests in the Wrestling World
2 Numbers Which Reveal the Overwhelming Level of Human Devastation Wrought by the Holocaust
The Deep Depths of Ideological Depravity: Comparing the Holocaust to the Covid-19 Vaccine
Unfortunately, Christian Nationalism Is the Normal, Much More Longstanding Version of Christianity
7 Great Counterculture Authors Who Inspire My Writing and Zionist Activism
Why Twitter & Social Media Are Such a Poison Brew of Antisemitism, Hate, Death, and Lies
The Antisemitism of Noam Chomsky's Far Left Anarcho-Syndicalist Ideological Cult
Why I Make a Point to Avoid Analyzing or Pontificating on Internal Israeli Politics
Joe Rogan: Just a Full-Blown Idiot, Not a Full-Blown Jew Hater... Yet...
How to Revive King & Heschel's Black & Jewish Anti-Racism Prophetic-Activist Partnership
In Celebration of Noa Tishby, an Inspiring Israeli Warrior-Artist Fighting Antisemitism
Meet Gifted Canadian Zionist Writer Sadie-Rae Werner and Check Out These 10 of Her Essays