Shlomo Hamelech’s wisdom is proverbial. What would he say to us about our affairs today? Here’s my guess:
Shalom Jews of the 5th millenium!
3,000 years ago, I created the most opulent and powerful Jewish nation, and now Klal Yisrael is doing it again in modern Eretz Yisrael! Yesher Koach!!!
60 years, eh? MAZAL TOV!! But where will you be in 600 years? …6,000?
I built an Israel of numerous cities, copper smelting furnaces in the Negev, and the first Temple, of stone and cedar and pure gold. It wasn’t easy. I had to give land away and sell some people as slaves in Tyre to pay for it all. I made foreign alliances with Egypt and Phoenicia. Politics is hell.
After I died (between 926-922 BCE), the ten northern tribes refused to submit to my son, Rehoboam. My kingdom splintered: in the north, Israel; and in the south, Judah. Then Moab revolted against Judah, and Ammon seceded from Israel.
So we had two tiny little separate nations for over two hundred years. Then in 722 BC, the Assyrians conquered Israel and scattered the ten northern tribes who were then lost to Klal Yisrael forever. Oy …a broch.
Jews of the 5th millenium: in every generation, see how they rise up against us, to destroy us. Yes, I know Hashem saves us, but only if we lift our own hands….National power and economic and military strength is an absolute necessity. But is it enough?
The blood-drenched battlefields of Europe are almost emptied of Jews. Klal Yisrael is again split in two: those in-gathered to Eretz Yisrael and those in the other goldene medinah—America!! (I know, we mustn’t forget Canada, Australia…even at the end of the earth in Perth!…after all, every neshama is a whole world…)
How will we prevail over those who would destroy us? Every snake we decapitate grows ten more heads from the root. But great empires rot from within…look at the USSR …people want to be free. Once they recognise that each human soul is an infinitely valuable world, not just fodder for despots, they’ll starve the snakes at the roots.
Unless we fall apart first.
Yes, we should use our military might with full force (directed by the ethics of our fathers), but we must also carry the message that will repair the world, with utmost persuasiveness.
United we prevail. Divided we fall.
Even in little Perth, you have several shuls, a school, Maurice Zeffert Home, Zionist organisations, youth movements…how fantastic!! Every group has its own “brand”…good. But don’t be fooled by your own bullshit. The enemies are plotting to divide the nation and scatter the dissident tribes. Don’t fall into their traps.
Gather together…marshall all your persuasive forces. Some of you are frum, some are not so frum. You even have non-Jews who observe the Noahite laws, and are your friends. (Fancy that!) Don’t judge your fellow. Seek the common ground. Gather them in, with love.
Then all the world will observe the Noahite laws. And Klal Yisrael will welcome the Mashiach…sooner than we realise.