A Reasonable Conclusion

If My people would heed Me, if Israel would go in My ways, in a moment I would humble their enemies and against their foes I would turn My hand.  Psalm 81:14-15 (Hebrew Bible) Robert Alter

In a moment – God made a promise 3000 years ago.  That promise was simple.  If Israel keeps His ways, He will protect them from their enemies.  Of course, the Psalmist decries the fact that Israel has not kept God’s ways.  Even before the Captivity, God was pleading with Israel to be faithful—or the inevitable would follow.  Joshua said virtually the same thing when the troops were defeated at Ai.  If God’s promise is true, then why have we lost the battle?  The only answer had to be sin in the camp, and with the discovery of Achan’s treachery, the problem was resolved.  Now, thousands of years later, we seem to have fallen into the same hole.  Israel is under attack from all sides.  Its citizens are killed.  Its forces are in danger.  Why?

We are left with only a few options.  First, the God of Israel is impotent against modern enemies.  That answer must be dismissed on theological grounds.  Second, Israel has sinned.  This answer fits the biblical narrative but seems totally unreasonable.  We ask, “Why should the innocents be tortured, raped, and slaughtered just because some in Israel don’t keep the Law?”  We are asking a question about fairness and justice—both of which may not apply.  Joshua discovered that his soldiers fell because of the sin of one man.  Perhaps God doesn’t rescue Israel today because of the sins of other men.  After all, the State of Israel is not observant.  Why should we expect God to intervene?  But then we’re back at the fairness question.  Does God care so little about the innocent that He would allow this despite the sin of some?  And that takes us to the third possibility—God doesn’t care.

Oh, even writing those words seems blasphemous.  Given the character of the biblical God, how could we suggest such a thing?  We’re left between a rock and a hard place.  God is not impotent.  God cares.  So, the tragedy upon us must be because of sin.  But when we consider the lives of 1,000,000 children lost in the Holocaust, it just seems unconscionable to say it was because they sinned.  Children?  No, no God could be so callous, especially the God of the Bible.

What do we do with God’s “in a moment” promise?  Is it just the wishful imagination of an ancient poet?  Is it temporally conditioned, applying only to David’s kingdom?  Does it still hold today?  And if it does, then what in the world is happening?  Are we all, as sinful men, subject to the cruelty of the wicked just because we’ve fallen short?  If Paul is right (Romans 3), then what will our futures look like without God’s help?  There are no easy answers.  Perhaps there are no answers at all.  Rabbi Freedman’s declaration seems totally inappropriate (and impossible):

“ . . . we are required to love even the most wicked of our brethren and yearn for the day when they will repent and become tzaddikim.  We must treat others in accordance with their potential, not according to the way they are at the moment.”[1]

But the biblical text is filled with examples of men judged according to their deeds, not their potential.  Perhaps that Greek ideal has infected both Christian and Jewish notions of the heart of Man.  It’s nice to think we can “separate the person himself from his wicked actions by recognizing his true potential,”[2] but wicked actions determine character. Potential does not.

Topical Index: divine protection, Joshua 7:9, Romans 3:23, Psalm 81:14-15

[1] Rabbi Shraga Freedman, Living Kiddush Hashem, p. 218

[2] Ibid., fn. 10.