TheSong of the Dove

 

Today, the People of Israel has to a large extent come home, and the abandoned desert land, lying fallow for generations, has once again offered her fruits to her children. Yet there is still much to be done, and the last stage, the stage of the Return of all the peoples of the world to a true relationship with their Father in Heaven, has only just begun.

What is required is an understanding, on the part of all the involved players, of the real rules and responsibilities of the game. The descendants of Jacob must delve into their souls to determine the true and exact nature of their responsibility as the caretakers and developers of the Lord's Promised Land. And all the other nations of the world, most importantly the spiritual descendants of Jacob's twin brother Esau and of his uncle Ishmael, must also do some soul searching, to determine what the ancient biblical narrative reveals as their part in the Lord's plan for His planet.⁴⁷

A special effort is required of Amalek, who has invested all his energies over the years in destroying the House of Jacob. By now, he surely should be aware of the futility of his efforts. Even suicide attacks against the Successor of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob cannot work. Nothing can break the eternal will of the Lord. Nothing can shatter or even alter the pact that He forged, on His on volition, with Abraham, to give him and his true descendant successors the Promised, Holy Land, forever.

At the end of the long night of Jacob's exile from the land, the past two hundred and fifty years have been a stark testimony to the vitality of this pact. The Land of Israel, like all of the Biblical prophets foretold, is now coming to life, after millennia of neglect and decay. The Biblical People of Israel, spurred on knowingly or unwittingly by the vision of the prophets of the Bible, have come home. No mortal power, not even the physical force of Esau his twin brother or the cunning diplomacy of Ishmael his uncle, can dislodge him.

We have stated that the spiritual and physical descendants of the Ishmael, Esau and Jacob have a pivotal role to play in the final unfolding of the stages of this process. Now is the time to state clearly how each of these family members can contribute.

As we discussed earlier, the way to purification and repair is to correct those traits which are blocking the way to Return (See Repairing the World: The Concept of Return).

Ishmael's Return: to Righteousness

We have seen that the Lord Himself promises that Ishmael will survive throughout ages by means of his skill at taking for himself the rightful property of others. Now is the time for Ishmael to Return to Righteousness, renouncing the trait that has served him so long, for a new trait, an honesty with himself, his family members and the Lord. As part of this Return, Ishmael will relinquish his insistence on pursuing the greatest robbery of all, the attempted theft of the land from the people whom the Lord has promised He will give it. The Bible says that the land alternately known as the Land of Canaan, the Land of Israel and the Land of Palestine is in truth the property of the Lord alone:

And the land shall not be sold permanently, because the land is Mine, since you are guests and settlers by Me. (Leviticus 25:23)

The Lord has given this land to Ishmael's nephew Jacob and his descendants as an inheritance for all time.⁴⁸

Perhaps soon Ishmael will be prepared to accept what he already knows inside, that were he to relinquish his claim, a claim that stems from his own character weaknesses, then the blessing that the Lord directs to all of His world would flow forth from his nephew to him and all the nations of the world, and Ishmael and his descendants would find a peace and harmony that they never imagined could exist.

Esau's Return: to Compassion

And what about Esau? The same concept of return applies to Jacob's twin brother. Yet the Bible tells us that Esau's weakness differs from that of his uncle Ishmael. Though no stranger to taking the property of others by force, Esau and his descendants real foible lies in a proclivity for shedding human blood. Time and again, Esau has sought to destroy his brother Jacob. Though clearly the Lord makes use of Esau's passions to chastise the Jewish People, Esau has not been a reluctant participant. From the actual relationship between the two twins, until our own time, with the fiery furnaces of the Nazi death factories, Esau has waged an unceasing war of attrition against his brother.

In addition to the physical battle described above, Esau has also waged a spiritual war against his brother, one bent at reclaiming the birth right that he relinquished for the price of a bowl of stew. His vehicle is missionizing Christianity, which claims to be the true source of the revelation of the Divine plan in the world.⁴⁹

Yet despite these continuing hostilities, overt or covert, this web site has tried to show that Esau has another, softer side to his personality. Esau clearly evidenced a desire to please his parents, and even felt remorse for some of his actions. Esau grew up in a household where the concept of compassion for others was a staple like bread on the table. The time has come for Esau to return to Compassion for his brother, and for himself. Esau must replace the glint of murder in his eyes with a tear of compassion.

Yet tears for the years of wrongdoing are merely the beginning. And laying down the weapons of hundreds of generations of conflict is not enough. Esau must change course, and instead of relentlessly pursuing his brother, he must now begin to work for the establishment of his brother in the land that the Lord so surely promised to Jacob. Instead of constantly seeking ways of destroying the reborn nation of Israel in its land, either through physical destruction or through the spiritual destruction of missionizing and cultural conquest, Esau must turn to building the fledgling country with the same zeal which he has reserved for Israel's destruction.

Only in this way can Esau himself be redeemed. And when the descendants of Esau are prepared to return this way, then they too will benefit from the tidal wave of blessing that will flood the world as the long-awaited Repair gets underway.

Jacob's Return: to Faith

And finally, what about Jacob and his descendants, the Children of Israel? Could it be that his family, Ishmael and Esau, would be busy returning to their Maker and repairing what they have broken, while Jacob sits idle on the sidelines, a mere spectator?

As we have seen in the sections of this web site, the Lord chose Abraham to carry the message of His existence to all the nations of the world. Furthermore, the Lord decreed that this profound responsibility be passed to Abraham's son, Isaac, and He directed in turn that Isaac's son Jacob should continue in the footsteps of his father and grandfather. As a further step in this process, the Lord took Jacob and his family into exile in Egypt, and even as the Egyptians enslaved them, the Lord built them into a great and numerous nation. When He decided that the time of redemption had arrived, He whisked the Nation of Israel out from Egypt and led them through the desert on their way to the land that the Lord promised to their forefathers: the Land of Israel.

But before they arrived in the land, the Lord took this nation of Israel by the hand, and, in front of their very eyes, in a fiery presentation on a mountain in the wilderness of Sinai, forged His pact with them for all time. The nature of this pact was simple but profound: in fulfillment of the Lord's promises to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, He contracted to bring the Nation of Israel back to the land He had given to their forefathers, and the Nation of Israel committed itself with one voice with obeying the Lord's Laws that he gave to Moses on Mount Sinai.

As part of this package deal, the Lord revealed that Israel would not always succeed in holding to its side of the bargain. The results of non-compliance, says the narrative of the Bible, will prove disastrous:

I call to witness for you, today, the Heavens and Earth: you will surely and quickly be lost from the face of the land that you are crossing the Jordan to inherit there. You will not lengthen days on her, but rather you will be shattered. And the Lord will distribute you among the peoples, and you will remain small in number, there, among the nations where the Lord has directed you. (Deuteronomy 4:25-27)

But not only does the Lord reveal this aspect of history: He, in His infinite and unending mercy, makes it part and parcel of the agreement that one day, Jacob will return to the Lord, not just from fear of punishment, but out of Love and understanding of the Greatness of the Creator:

...you will return to the Lord, and you will hear His voice, all that I command you today, you and your children, with all your hearts and all your souls. And the Lord your God will circumcise your heart, and the heart of your descendants, to love the Lord with all your heart and all your soul, so that you will live. (Deuteronomy 30:2, 6)

From this passage in the Bible, it is clear that Jacob's Return to the Lord with love, is part of the Lord's very fabric of design for the world. It is to this that Jacob's descendants, the Jewish nation, must aspire and accomplish. It is towards this goal that all thinking and feeling Jews, all over the world, must focus their energies and all their attention at making a reality. The Jewish People, in all its diverse entirety, must come face to face with its true destiny: to return to the Lord with all their heart and all their soul, through Love.

The Purpose of Creation

The Return of these three family members and their myriad descendants is nothing less than the primary purpose of creation. Everything comes around toward this one goal. And the fruition and actualization of this process is poised in the hands of the peoples of this most unusual generation. In the following paragraph from the book of Isaiah (from which a creatively truncated, politically correct section is excerpted for display at the entrance of the United Nations building in New York), the ancient prophet of Israel calls out directly to this generation:

THE PROPHECY THAT ISAIAH THE SON OF AMOTZ ENVISIONED ABOUT JUDAH AND JERUSALEM:
 

And it will be, at the End of Days, that the mountain of the House of the Lord will be established as the head of mountains, and it will be lifted up higher than all heights; and to it will stream all the nations.

And many nations will go and say, 'let's go, and we will ascend to the mountain of the Lord, to the House of the Lord of Jacob; He will teach us of His paths, and we will walk in His ways' ...

... because from Zion will go forth the teaching, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

And He will judge between the nations; and call to task many peoples; ...

[Here, in the middle of the Biblical verse, begins the quotation made famous at the UN:]

... and they will crush their swords into shovels, and their spears into pruning shears; nations will not wield the sword against other nations, and they will no longer learn war. (Isaiah 2:1-4)

Dare we all, together, people of every nation, with one heartbeat, with the same breath, take up the challenge and return, as remorseful children to the Lord Who has created us, nurtured us, and never abandoned hope that all of us will one day return to Him, in full, in this life, with Love?

47 The Babylonian Talmud (Talmud Bavli), Tractate Avodah Zarah, 2, b:

... They [the Nations of the World] say before Him, "Master of the Universe, You never gave us the Law; therefore we didn't accept it upon ourselves!" But can this [their claim] truly be said? Here, it is written: "The Lord came from Sinai, and He shined forth to them from Seir; he appeared from Mount Paran" (Deuteronomy 33:2); and it is also written, "the Lord from Teiman [a city in the territory of Edom] will come ..." (Habbakuk 3:3). What does He want in Seir and what does he want in Teiman? Said Rabbi Yohanan (John), "this teaches that the Holy One, may He Be Blessed, courted every nation and language [to give them the Law], and they didn't receive it, until He came to Israel - and they received it."

48 The Simon Anthology (Yalkut Shimoni), Section Exodus, Paragraph 187, quoted by Rashi (Rabbi Shlomo Yitzhaki, Solomon the son of Isaac), Commentary on the Pentateuch, Genesis 1:1:

Said Rabbi Isaac: "He [The Lord] could have begun the Law at the verse "This month is for you the head of the months... (Exodus 12, 2), since this is the first commandment that Israel is commanded. What is the reason [the Lord] began [the Law] at "In the beginning?"

Because "the strength of His deeds he spoke to His people, to give to them the inheritance of nations" (Psalms 111:6); that if the nations of the world were to say to Israel 'You are thieves, since you conquered lands of the seven [Canaanite] nations" They [Israel] will answer them "The whole Earth is the Holy One's, May He Be Blessed. He created it and gave it to whom was right in his eyes. According to His will he gave it, and according to His will He took it from them and gave it to us.'

49 The Concept of Messiah in Judaism and Christianity

Judaism has never been allowed the opportunity for a fair and open effort to rebut the dominant Christian understanding of the concept of Messiah. This is because of the constant threat to Jewish existence that the Christian world has always wielded, and frequently unleashed, to ensure that Judaism keeps silent about this topic.

In our times, it is possible to examine the issues honestly, drawing directly upon the esoteric Jewish traditions about the Meshiach (the original Hebrew word meaning 'anointed king,' that takes on the transliterated spelling in English of 'messiah'). Because of the constant danger to Jewish survival, this topic has been rarely discussed or even understood within Jewish circles, let alone by non-Jews. In our day, as the long exile comes to an end, an honest and open examination of Jewish traditional sources shows Christianity's notion of an admixture of divine, spiritual and human qualities in one entity to be much more closely related to the widespread Roman practice of emperor deification, than to the authentic, historical development process behind the Jewish Meshiach.

The Christian interpretation and remaking of the traditional Jewish concept of messiah is actually another form of Esau's attempts to retake the blessings and birth right that he relinquished to his brother Jacob, as described in the biblical narrative. Esau has therefore used Christianity as a vehicle for wresting the high priesthood from his brother Jacob. Tragically for all, Esau has never fully accepted the truth: that this spiritual responsibility was never really intended for him.

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