Peace in the Face of War

thus marginalising the more open, gracious, intellectual and mystical
tendencies in Islam that were in the past the source of its greatness. It was a
strategy remarkable in its long time-horizons, its precision, patience, detail
and dedication. If moderation and religious freedom are to prevail, they
will require no less. We must train a generation of religious leaders and
educators who embrace the world in its diversity, and sacred texts in their
maximal generosity. 1
By way of encouragement we could say to the Israeli Jew, this is best for you:
remove your thumbs from the throat of your Palestinian brother. Put your
arm around his shoulders instead and comfort him. This is the will of God for
you, for is it not written in your Scriptures to love, forgive, help your enemy,
love the stranger, speak peace and pursue it? To be fair, we would also have
to acknowledge that the Israeli throat is also in a stranglehold grip of a group
of nations that does not seek after its long–term well–being. Role reversal
would help both sides to reveal its pain and bow its head to the shoulder of
his brother, ideally with tears.
Israel’s statehood was a godsend for the Jewish people, but for the Palestinians
it was an unimaginable catastrophe (nakba), as nearly a million fled and/
or were expelled from the homes and towns by an implacable army of new
arrivals. Thus we come to the final, remaining issue of the conflict in Israel,
the conflict over the land. Here the religious Jew finds himself, typically,
between a rock and a hard place, between what might be called sagas of war, 2
written prior to the destruction of the First and Second Temples, and the
rabbinic/prophetic witness after the Temple’s first century demise:
Judaism survived through its scholars, not its soldiers…. They were not
pacifists but they were realists. They knew that the real battles are the ones
that take place in the mind and the soul…. That is the wisdom the zealots do
not understand: not then and not now. 3
To us outsiders, it would seem the land is a symbol of God’s entitlement for
the Jewish people. But it can also be an idol. Killing in God’s Name, the focus
of Dr Sack’s book, is not an option for the people who warned the world
about idol worship. Nevertheless, as a good starting point for understanding
the contemporary Jewish mind, its faithfulness to Bible and Tradition, and
as a consultation document for reconciliation between the three Abrahamic
faiths, I would strongly recommend this book.
Christopher Mark CSWG
1
Sacks, op.cit., 262
2
i.e. Moses, Joshua, Gideon, and the Maccabees
3
Sacks, op.cit. 217
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