Shabbat Zakhor

[David Seidenberg]

There are many people who don't want to read chapter 9 of the megillah, which describes the Jews massacring 70,000 of their enemies on Purim. Many people might also wish to not read the command to exterminate Amalek on this shabbat, especially since that command has been applied, with wild abandonment of reason, to Palestinians. 

This people are davka the people who are least likely to be harmed by those readings. In fact, it is not we, who despise the adoration of violence that those readings push, who should not read those passages. It's all the people who do NOT have a problem with those passages, and that violence, who should not be reading them. 

In this moment, when settler violence in the West Bank is sharply and rapidly escalating, it is only a matter of time before extremist settlers massacre a village, rachmana lits'lan. Unless the IDF/govt finally chooses to intervene -- which I fear cannot happen with Smotrich involved. I am very afraid this year about the news we could wake up to next Tuesday. If prayer matters, we should be praying with all our hearts that Palestinian villages in the West Bank are protected from this violence. 

The third paragraph of the tefilah (prayer) for the land that I wrote might be helpful in this context. I did not write this email in order to tout the prayer, but I am thinking that it would be irresponsible to wish that people would pray without providing anything useful to help them do that. But I'm also wondering if anyone has written a prayer that more specifically and more explicitly addresses these issues. 

The paragraph from the prayer I wrote about all the land of Israel/Palestine is: 

"Rescue all of Your land, from the Jordan River to the sea, from the spilling of blood, and all residing and sojourning there, under every government, from haters without and hatred within.* Grant peace and abundance and healing throughout the land, and secure calm to her defenders, lasting joy to all her inhabitants, and real hope for all her peoples. And let us say: Amen." The Hebrew is found at https://neohasid.org/resources/Prayer-state/ .

May all beings be happy, well, and peaceful,

Shabbat shalom,

David Seidenberg

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