The Maccabees were not feminists (classical or the JOFA variety), pluralists, humanists, Woman of the Wall militants, advocates for gay rights, or for murdering babies in utero. The Maccabees were not defending indigenous rights to the land. The Maccabees were zealots preserving Torah. They were extremists. They were fundamentalists.
Yeah, baby . . . YEAH!!!
Ping.
I never liked that Hellen :)
But seriously, Very Interesting article, which will have me looking up names for hours. :)
Seems to me, Israel forgets sometimes who the Big Boss is, and He wouldn’t like abortion or a female couple on their version of Dancing with the Stars.
Second best military in the world after ours, and they need it. Hindu pacifism has NO place there, as the arabs are not England. Though England could be ruthless, they bowed to the pressure.
Arabs would just slaughter Jews where they stood with their peace signs.
Being the chosen people is a great honor, but also a great responsibility, I assume
But what do I know :)
” ... we must wage war against Hellenism in every generation, in a manner that recalls our unrelenting war with Amalek. “
So many confusing terms in the essay. For a better understanding, I consulted Wikipedia to find the definition for Amalek. The section is a bit lengthy, but these items caught my attention:
In Judaism, the Amalekites came to represent the archetypal enemy of the Jews. In the Jewish folklore the Amalekites are considered to be the symbol of evil. This concept ha. . .s been used by some hassidic rabbis (particularly the Baal Shem Tov) to represent atheism or the rejection of God. Nur Masalha, Elliot Horowitz and Josef Stern suggest that Amalekites have come to represent an “eternally irreconcilable enemy” that wants to murder Jews, and that Jews in post-biblical times sometimes associate contemporary enemies with Haman or Amalekites, and that some Jews believe that pre-emptive violence is acceptable against such enemies.
(n). . . There are also more specific historical identifications of the people of Amalek. It is well known that in medieval rabbinic literature Esau, and his land Edom, are typologically identified with Rome and, in turn, with Christianity. . .
Some commentators have discussed the ethics of the commandment to exterminate all the Amalekites, including the command to kill all the women, children, and the notion of collective punishment.[20] Maimonides [12th century] explains that the commandment to destroy the nation of Amalek requires the Jewish people to peacefully request that they accept upon themselves the Noachide laws and pay a tax to the Jewish kingdom. Only if they refuse must they be physically killed.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amalek