Unprecedented polarization, or has Israel been here before? With Meir Soloveichik

Today’s guest, Rabbi Meir Soloveichik, has strong views on Israel’s history and its relevance to the current moment. He is the senior rabbi of Congregation Shearith Israel in Manhattan, the oldest Jewish congregation in the United States. He is also director of the Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought at Yeshiva University. Rabbi Soloveichik has a must-listen daily podcast called Bible 365, and he writes a monthly column in Commentary magazine, and his writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, Mosaic, the Jewish Review of Books, and many other outlets. He is also the author of a superb book of his own, called “Providence and Power: Ten Portraits in Jewish Statesmanship.”

---

Transcript

DISCLAIMER: THIS TRANSCRIPT HAS BEEN CREATED USING AI TECHNOLOGY AND MAY NOT REFLECT 100% ACCURACY.

[00:00:00] Welcome to Call Me Back. One quick housekeeping note before we get into today's conversation. If I sound like I have a little bit of a cold today, it's because I am under the weather. But really, I just want to prove to you, my loyal listeners, that this podcast has not been taken over by a bot. It is not produced by Artificial Intelligence.

Yet, this is me. Dan Senor, I want to pick up on last week's conversation with Yossi Klein Halevi and the question I asked in that episode is whether Yossi was optimistic or pessimistic about Israel's future. It's a question we should all be thinking about. Are you pessimistic about Israel's future? My new book, which I coauthored with Saul Singer, we coauthored Startup Nation together over a decade ago, will give you, we believe, reason [00:01:00] for optimism.

And we're doing a special pre order campaign for my podcast listeners. If you order the new book, The Genius of Israel, The Surprising Resilience of a Divided Nation in a Turbulent World, if you pre order the book between now and this Friday, basically between now and Kol Nidre, and you send your receipt in to book at dansenor.

com, that's book at dansenor. com, we'll send you a special chapter sampler. The deals with issues being debated in Israel and about Israel right now, more on that in a moment. But the sampler will just give you a couple of chapters, one in particular that's extremely relevant to the discussion we're going to have today.

And I think discussions that are going on more broadly. In fact, if you spent time at synagogue over Rosh Hashanah this past weekend. Chances are you heard a sermon about Israel. Many rabbis in services across the United States, and really the broader diaspora, focused on the challenges [00:02:00] facing Israel today in their sermons, specifically internal challenges.

And what so many are talking about is the unprecedented division. Even polarization over reforms to Israel's judiciary. But it goes beyond that. This unprecedented division is really about competing, perhaps even irreconcilable, we are told, visions for what it means to have a Jewish sovereign democracy.

Now to be clear, I personally share some of the criticisms of this Israeli government and its approach to judicial reform. And I also believe many of the leading critics over here on this issue Come at it in good faith, out of love and admiration for Israel. They are Zionists. But I couldn't help but focus on the one word I mentioned a moment ago.

That is unprecedented. Is Israel facing unprecedented division? That is the word we keep hearing over and over and over that we've entered a space and a place that we've never been before as it relates to Israel and its [00:03:00] internal divide. I do not think that is accurate. Israel has been deeply, deeply divided before.

And just as these divisions in previous eras appear to push Israel to the brink, Israelis somehow pulled back. And their country hung together. Now each situation is different, and this time may be unique too. Or, maybe there's something special about Israeli society that, unlike in other Western democracies, has societal shock absorbers that protect against political polarization truly unraveling its country.

Now our next book is focused on Israel's societal resilience. As I said, it's called The Genius of Israel, and it'll be published on November 7th, and, as I said, you can pre order it now. wherever you purchase books online. And if you send your receipt to book at DanSinor. com, we will send you a special exclusive sampler, a couple of relevant chapters.

There are a lot of areas and metrics we discovered in writing this book that [00:04:00] spoke to us, to the health and vibrancy of Israeli society, but there's one chapter in particular that speaks to this period. In which there seems to be a sense of despair about what is happening in Israel and its political debates.

And in this chapter, Saul and I look at Israel's history, and show that there have been comparable periods of despair. Take for example the debate over Israel's disengagement from the Gaza Strip, which ultimately took place in the summer of 2005. Here's how the New York Times reported on the protests against The Israeli government withdrawing from the Gaza Strip.

The coverage sounds eerily similar to the coverage of the current moment. I'm going to quote here from the New York Times. Tens of thousands of Israelis held hands on Sunday to form a colorful human chain that stretched 56 miles from the Gaza Strip to the Western Wall in the Old City as a protest against Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan.

The size of the demonstration, organizers estimated that 200, [00:05:00] 000 Israelis took place, though the police put the number at 70, 000, represented perhaps the gravest challenge yet to Mr. Sharon's disengagement plan. The demonstrators stretched along some of the nation's major highways. Finding footholds on brush covered slopes or enduring a blazing late afternoon sun in dusty road junctions.

They waved Israeli flags and held banners denigrating Mr. Sharon. Now what's interesting, by the way, is something like 30 members of Knesset, of Israel's parliament participated in this particular protest, including Reen Rivlin, who was the speaker of the Knesset at the time, and went on to become Israel's president and was viewed as a unifying force, and the Sharan government was trying.

to jam through this disengagement from Gaza without a majority government. So one could argue they didn't even have a mandate to do what they were doing. Again, elements of this start to sound familiar. We go through the Gaza disengagement period and its divisions in Israel, and we go [00:06:00] back throughout history.

I'm going to read right now from the chapter in the book that I'll be sending you when you pre order the book. I'm quoting here from the chapter called the wars of the Jews. And we write in 1952. So even going back soon after the founding of the state, in 1952, when the state was still young and struggling to absorb hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees from Europe and the Arab world, Ben Gurion's government negotiated an agreement with West Germany to accept reparations for the Holocaust.

Menachem Begin, the leader of the Heirut party, Opposed the move. The Herut party was the opposition party at the time. The leader of the Herut party opposed the move Claiming that it was a form of pardon for nazi crimes Addressing a crowd of some 15 000 people at a time when israel's population was only 1, 630, 000 people, he gave an incendiary speech in which he attacked the government and called for its violent [00:07:00] overthrow.

Proportionately, this would be akin to 3 million people protesting in the United States. The demonstrators began marching toward the Knesset, which was then located in downtown Jerusalem. Policemen, who had set up roadblocks, were unable to control the angry crowd, some of whom managed to reach the doorstep of the parliament and began throwing stones in the plenum hall.

Where the debate was taking place the protests were eventually quelled but not before rioters injured several lawmakers Then in this chapter we go on to talk about the protests That occurred in opposition to the lebanon war in the 1980s We described protests that occurred in tel aviv against the government about 350 000 people went to the streets In a country of just four million people, and we describe a tragic outcome that happened at one of these protests in particular, when it really felt that Israel was on the brink, and then, of course, we include in the list of horribles, if you will, the most [00:08:00] horrible, which was, The assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, uh, at the time of the debate and the implementation of the Oslo Peace Accords.

We write in our book on November 4th, 1995, as Rabin was leaving the stage after the largest pro Oslo rally in Tel Aviv, he was shot twice in the back by Yigal Amir, a right wing Jewish extremist. The entire country, not just the left, mourned the Prime Minister and for a country that might never But the left did not only blame Yigal Amir, it blamed the entire right camp that supported Netanyahu, the leader of the Knesset opposition, and opposed the Oslo Accords.

The widowed Leah Rabin refused to shake Netanyahu's hand at her husband's funeral. The left camp also blamed religious people, because they tended to be on the right. Most shameful of all, particularly for religious people, Amir, the assassin, [00:09:00] came from a religious family, studied in religious schools. And war kippah, the head covering of religious people.

Rabin's assassination was another unthinkable, wrenchingly polarizing moment. One political camp blamed the other for the most heinous crime in Israel's history, while the other camp felt tarred with the crime it abhorred. It was hard to imagine how the bonds within society So, again, in our book and in this chapter that I'll send you right now, in particular, we go through this history that I think gives some important historical context for the moment we are in now.

Now the reason we are laying out all this history Is not to deny the importance of this particular moment, of these particular debates happening in the streets of Israel's cities and in the parliament of Israel and Jerusalem. In fact, Saul himself has been at these protests against the judicial reforms quite regularly.[00:10:00]

Rather it's just to give some badly needed perspective. I mean, perhaps Israel has been here before and has bounced back. And the question we're trying to understand, Why has Israel bounced back? Where other countries seem to be irreparably torn apart by political polarization. Now again, why is it timely?

Because the discussions about the debate in Israel is happening now. It actually is happening in synagogues now. In fact, you were probably exposed to it this past weekend over Rosh Hashanah. I'm sorry to say you'll probably be exposed to it next weekend when you're in services for Yom Kippur. And we just want you to have access to this history right here, right now, while Israel is so front and center in all your discussions.

So please pre order the book. Send your receipt to book, to book at DanSinor. com. Now onto today's discussion, which is with one rabbi who has very strong views on the way Israeli history is treated in the context that we're talking about, that is Rabbi Meir Soloveitchik. [00:11:00] Rabbi Soloveitchik is the senior rabbi of Congregation Shereth Israel in Manhattan.

The oldest Jewish congregation in the United States. He's also director of the Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought at Yeshiva University. He has a must listen daily podcast called Bible 365, which I highly recommend. And Meir Soloveitchik, or Sali, as we call him, is super prolific. He writes a monthly column in Commentary Magazine.

And his writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, including a terrific piece a couple weekends ago in the Weekend Edition, also the New York Times, Mosaic, the Jewish Review of Books, and many other outlets. He's also the author of a new book, which is superb, called Providence and Power, Ten Portraits in Jewish Statesmanship.

book alone is worthy of its own conversation, which I'll have him back on to discuss. And just sticking with this theme, Yossi Klein Halevi in the last episode, Meir Soloveitchik today. The next episode, which we're going to drop later this week, we'll drop on Thursday, is with Mika [00:12:00] Goodman, who's been on this podcast a couple of times before.

Again, we'll be talking about Israel's domestic political crisis. And then broader themes about Israeli society that we think are important to keep in mind as you try to determine how to engage with the current moment and how to think about it. Israel's domestic crisis. Have we been here before? This is Call Me Back.

And I am pleased to welcome back to this podcast, in person. Rabbi Meir Soloveitchik, Soli Soloveitchik. Sali, thanks for being here. It's so great to be here with you, Dan. It's so exciting to be here with you in the studio. I know, this is like, legit, right? Yeah, I mean, I may not be fan favorite Mike Murphy or anybody like that, but to be here in the studio with you is still a privilege.

If you brush up on your Jets fandom We may be able to turn you into the next Mohamed El Arian. I will say this. I don't know anything about the Jets, but I have been enjoying your morning Twitter reading of the New York [00:13:00] Post. Morning spelled both ways. Yes. Every, every morning and I'm in mourning. Indeed.

I, you know, I want, we're going to talk about. Jewish life and Jewish ideas in a moment, but we must start first start with the Jets. Yes, because you brought it up, right? I sort of brought it up, but you know, this podcast is basically, you know, geopolitics, the GOP, the Jews, and the Jets. I mean, that's basically our, you know, every podcast falls into one of those categories.

I was, two nights ago, I'm trying to analyze with one of my sons, Eli, who you know, about what happened and how it happened and how Rogers went down. And I said, well, the offensive line in the play, the O line called and Rogers hung onto the ball for too long. And he and Nathaniel Hackett, who's the offensive coordinator, weren't totally synced up.

And that few extra seconds of him hanging onto the ball versus letting go of it after the defense had broken the offensive line meant that the And he said And my son said to me, Dad, stop trying to [00:14:00] analyze it. Like, it's no one's fault. Right. These things happen. And by the way, this is a kid who's deeply, deeply shocked.

Yes. And sad. Sad for Aaron Rodgers, genuinely. Sad for the team. Sad for fans like us. He's like, everyone wants an answer. Everyone wants to say this and then that and then this. And it's just like, it's football. It's a live action contact sport. Aaron Rodgers isn't a young man, things happen, it could have happened in the first 10 minutes of the game, of the first game, it could have happened in the last 10 minutes of the last game of the season, like, you know, dashed expectations, that's life.

And I was speaking to a friend of mine, Josh Oprah, this morning, who said that's very Jewish. It's very Jewish. Oh yes, 100%. The fact is That human beings, human life, has frailty and vulnerability. There was an amazing article in the Times, maybe a year ago, about Michelangelo's David. [00:15:00] And, uh, how it's a seemingly sublime image of perfection, or so it's seen by so many, but it actually has a flaw that its ankles have cracks.

And this author reflected how when he visited Michelangelo's Dave in Florence, I happened to just recently be in Florence, I was thinking about this. Uh, as I was traveling there, uh, when he first visited Michelangelo's David as a young man, he thought, this is perfection, and this means that I should strive for perfection.

And then he tells us that actually there's this profound fall, uh, at the moment in his ankles. So much so that if there's an earthquake in Florence and the David, Tilt a little bit the ankles will crack and he ends up by reflecting that in the end perfection is no way to live Because we can't live that way One of the reasons I like Rembrandt's that are as much more than Michelangelo is that he shows us human beings as they are Flawed vulnerable and the heroism of human life is living In the [00:16:00] face of these challenges, the great show, Friday Night Lights, begins in the very same way, the first episode, where the quarterback, in whom they've invested so much hope, is suddenly, is suddenly injured, and the The Coach, we should find this and put this up.

Paralyzed. I mean, he's He's in that plot. He's paralyzed. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And the coach gives a speech. And it's an amazing speech. You just reminded me of it. And it's about the challenges of life. And so much of the heroism of life is how you face these challenges. And is my friend Josh right that there is something very Jewish about that?

A hundred percent. And that's, uh That's, of course, the message of the famous Armando Galarraga perfect imperfect game when the umpire, James, Jim Joyce, called the final runner safe when he was really out and ruined Armando Galarraga's perfect game and, uh, Uh, [00:17:00] he responded, uh, the pitcher gracefully, and Peggy Noonan has a wonderful article about that.

So much in life and sports is about athletes celebrating themselves for their successes and throwing tantrums when things don't go well. Yeah. Uh, and it's actually real life is how we respond to the great disappointments when things don't go our way. Uh, and that's where true heroism, or if you will, true perfection is actually to be found.

Okay. So, thank you for that, Drash. I, uh, I, I did not intend to leave. You know, I did the commentary podcast at the end of the day. This could be, people could use this for Yom Kippur, right? I got through the whole podcast without talking about the Jets. At the end, Podhorn says, he brings everybody. Oh, I heard, I heard, yeah.

So, I mean, it's, I'm not trying to bring it up in every conversation, but, you know, it does come up. I hope I've, I've helped in some way. We got a long way to go. We got a long way to go. Um, okay. So, we are in the middle of the high holidays. It is between Rosh Hashanah and Kol Nidre and Yom Kippur. And I was struck both by what I heard from friends who attended different congregations [00:18:00] over Rosh Hashanah and, uh, and what I sort of saw, a sampling of stuff.

You can now watch all these sermons. The message in almost every, uh, sermon that I know of was about Israel and, uh, what's going on in Israel. And, and in most cases, although not all, a lot of pessimism about Israel, um, some, some green shoots of optimism, which is, which I share and, uh, and, and, but, but this is, and, and, and, and a plea in fairness, a number of these rabbis, whether they're critical of Israel or not, they're saying, stay engaged, stay involved.

We need Israel. We need Israel to be strong and vibrant and stay involved. But I want to quote from one of the sermons, um, that I, uh, that I saw, uh, Angela, Rabbi Angela Buchdahl, who you know at Central Synagogue, and she quotes Micah Goodman. He, I guess he spoke at Central Synagogue last year, and he put this moment.

In Israel, into historical perspective, uh, when he told the congregation of the curse of the eighth decade, [00:19:00] only two other times in Jewish history did Jews have sovereignty over ourselves. The first Jewish state established by King David 3, 000 years ago, and the Hasmonean dynasty of the second temple period.

In both cases, internal strife in the eighth decade. Decade. That's Jew against. Jew precipitated our downfall and destruction. We were granted one more opportunity at sovereignty when the state of Israel was founded in 1948. Rabbi Boal says, but do the math. We're in the eighth decade. You don't have to be superstitious to believe that the curse of the eighth decade could strike again.

And so a lot of rabbis are looking at this period and saying, are we in the curse of the eighth decade? And again, it's not. I'm, I'm quoting Rabbi Book Tall, but it's. It's, this, this sentiment is everywhere. How do you respond? So, I'll say a couple of things. First, I have incredible optimism about where Israel is.

And, uh, that's linked to the profound strengths that it has as a society, which you, I [00:20:00] think, brilliantly outline in your forthcoming book. Thank you. And, uh, I've, I was just in Israel, and I see everything that you describe. Uh, and, uh, I'm, I'm profoundly, uh, filled with hope about, uh, what is yet to come and, uh, hope that indeed the best is yet, uh, to come.

I think it's always true, of course, that the Jewish people, uh, has to be worried about the dangers of infighting. I'm my own hero as Menachem Begin, and, uh, I speak and write often of how, uh, Begin's greatest moment for all the Uh, extraordinary achievements of his leadership. His greatest moment came, uh, at a time when he was not in a political position of power, and that is when, uh, Ben Gurion ordered, uh, the firing upon on the Irgun ship, Alta Lena, uh, and, uh, Begin ordered his men not to shoot back precisely because, as he later described, he remembered the internecine wars of [00:21:00] the Second Temple period and how that undid the Second Jewish Commonwealth and how he would not let that undo the Third Jewish Commonwealth.

And coming, uh, really a month after the Declaration of Independence of the State of Israel, it is that act, I think, that, that saved Israel, uh, and, uh, is, I think, the greatest moment in his career, though there are, of course, many great moments. So what we do have to constantly keep that in mind. At the same time, I think, marking this decade in the history of modern Israel is a source of great joy and awe and looking back at the two periods that you referenced in your question.

The two periods. Seventh decade moments, uh, where, uh, Israel split, uh, do teach us lessons, but the lessons to be drawn are, are beyond just the dangers of infighting. There are other lessons that, without emphasizing anybody in particular, that at least some who cite the seventh decade, [00:22:00] those lessons are not the ones that are being drawn, but I think are worth, are worth stressing.

So, maybe we should start with the first temple and then do The second temple, we'll have to just do the whole, you know, first temple history. It's going to take eight, nine hours, so it's, I assume you're listeners. We have a loyal audience. Yeah, exactly. We have a loyal audience. They'll be good. They're patient.

They're a patient bunch. As I speak now, your audience is hitting that 30 second fast forward like 8, 000 times. Yeah, 2x. Yeah, 2x. 2x. 2x time. 2x time. So let's start with the split that happened right after Solomon's reign, uh, in the first temple period, and then we'll do the Hasmonean dynasty in the second temple.

In the first temple Uh, what occurred was the following, uh, David, uh, conquers Jerusalem, uh, and makes it his capital precisely, uh, for the purpose of Jewish unity, or I should say Israelite unity. That's, uh, because, uh, it was a city that was on the border of two tribes that had been warring with each other before.

Uh, the house of Saul was of the tribe of Benjamin, the house of David [00:23:00] was of the tribe of Judah, and the two were neighboring tribes and they were warring against each other over who would succeed King Saul. Uh, and, uh, David, chose Jerusalem, among other reasons perhaps, for the central reason that it was a shared city on the border of Judah and Benjamin.

So it actually embodied, uh, unity itself, Jewish unity itself, or Israelite, uh, unity. Then Solomon reigns in Jerusalem and he succeeds in, uh, achieving what had been David's dream, which is crowning Jerusalem with a temple of God, a dwelling place of the divine. The reason why David, uh, dreamed of this temple was because he sought to emphasize that all that he had achieved, and he wanted to remind the Israelite polity that all that he had achieved and all the miracles in the story of Israel were really by the grace of God, for all the brilliance of his military endeavors, and they were indeed brilliant.

It's all by grace of God. And so he crowned his city. Or he wanted to crown his city above his palace with a temple. So what he says to the prophet [00:24:00] Nathan, he says, how could my palace be the highest point in the city? He

behold, I dwell in a palace of cedar, but the arc of of the covenant, of the throne of God is still in a tent. It's not right. And God, for reasons that are beyond the scope of today's podcast, God said no to David about building the temple. But he said, your son Solomon will build it, will build it. Solomon builds a temple.

And to David's vision of the temple as a source of faith and inspiration for all of Israel, Solomon, if you read his inaugural speech, when they dedicate the temple, he adds an amazing expansion. He says that this, this city and its temple, crowning it, will not be a source of inspiration only for my people.

It will be a source of inspiration Uh, for non Israelites as well, who will see the wonder of the story of the people of Israel, and they will be drawn to Jerusalem, to this place. In other words, [00:25:00] Solomon, as Isaiah spoke later, saw Jerusalem as being a beacon of faith and inspiration to the world. So what was Solomon's mistake?

Because the vision is breathtaking. Mm hmm. And beautiful. His mistake was how to achieve this vision. Rather than just build an independent polity that would be a source, uh, that would serve as a beacon. What Solomon sought was empire. Empire, right. Empire. And if, if one of the first things we learn about Solomon is that he marries the daughter of Pharaoh.

Toby Wilkinson, the Egyptologist, in his, uh, history of ancient Egypt notes that, that almost never happened. That pharaohs would send, uh, Their daughters elsewhere, princesses from foreign countries were sent to Pharaohs to marry. Pharaohs wouldn't send their daughters anywhere. And if that's happening here, that means that Egypt, this incredibly powerful country for so many hundreds and hundreds of years is profoundly weak and Solomon is strong.

And Solomon ends up creating diplomatic marriages [00:26:00] with all these different countries. And this was part of his expansion of empire. How do you maintain an empire? through taxation. Uh, and that also becomes, uh, part of, uh, his policy. And it's ultimately the taxation that continues to be enforced even more rigorously by his son, Rechavam, Rechavam, that leads to the splitting, to the splitting of the monarchy.

And the Bible emphasizes this was not just political. Solomon's attempt at empire had the opposite effect that it intended. Rather than spread biblical values and the biblical vision outward from Jerusalem, it brought paganism. into Jerusalem. And the splitting of the monarchy was a divinely ordained punishment for that.

Now then, if we stop for a second and compare it to modern Israel. Now, of course, Solomon's Jerusalem had something that modern Israel lacks, which is a temple. But that said, in the moment in which we find ourselves, [00:27:00] Israel is a strong, independent Jewish country that does not seek to be an empire. And moreover, incredibly, it really is a source of inspiration for not just Jews, but for millions of biblically inspired individuals from around the world.

If you go to Israel and Sukkot, have you been in Israel and Sukkot? I've been there. So they have this parade now, where Uh, uh, Christians come from countries all over the world, Africa, and I think South America, and you can't get any, you can't move in Jerusalem. Right. Um, and so we're not yet at the time, as Isaiah describes, where the temple is built and nations from all over the world are, are streaming to, to, to Jerusalem.

We're not in a time where no one is inspired by Jewish Jerusalem either. We live in a wondrous age where Jerusalem is Jewish. It's a Jewish capital, a Jewish city. And the very Jewishness of Jerusalem [00:28:00] is what inspires non Jews all around the world. And so it is right to learn the lessons from Solomon, but Solomon's Jerusalem didn't split because of Uh, internecine fighting, not according to the Bible.

It's split as a divinely ordained punishment, uh, and as a rebellion. Against empire building. A rebellion against what Solomon had had to produce. Right. In his empire. So it's a very different situation. And in fact, let me just add one other point, if that's okay. Israel has marked now over 70 years as a democracy, using for all of its flaws, And no one would argue that it's political system is perfect and seamless.

But for all of its flaws, it has the same political system, democratic system, for how many years are we marking now? Right, 75. 75 years, plus years. Think about the countries in Europe that can't claim that. France. [00:29:00] Israel has gone through several different forms of republic and other monarchical governments, but its own republic is, is, is not, the current republic did not extend for 75 years.

Spain transitioned from Franco to democracy not that long ago. Germany, we know the story. Israel, like we say, America is a young country, but it's the longest, uh, longest continuous democracy on earth. Israel has had the same democratic system. And it's And it's weathered challenges a lot longer than some of the most famous countries in the West.

So this should be a source, not of foreboding in the same way that some are arguing, but of extraordinary awe and celebration. So the, the comparison I give, which is probably not the one you would, you would give, but when I, when I talk to friends of mine who are, have been very critical of the Israeli government and very critical of the judicial reforms and the debate that it sparked and the division and the polarization, and I think all those things are [00:30:00] true, I just say, leave Israel out of it.

Take a step back. A country has an election. Uh, after four failed elections, failed in that they didn't produce a government. A government. So dysfunctional politics, which is followed by an election where one coalition of parties wins a majority, wins 64 seats. They're able to govern. We can debate whether or not they had a mandate to unveil, to try to jam through the first round of judicial reforms.

I think they didn't really talk about it as much in the campaign as they claim they did, so I don't think there was as much of a mandate, but be that as it may, they won, and they're entitled to. Push their own agenda. They pushed very energetically, very ambitiously. Many, me included, think they overshot and it sparked a reaction.

By the way, not a violent reaction, not not not vandalism and destruction of property and lighting flags on fire. It, it, it catalyzed or provoked a, a very heated, very, very heated, sometimes the language [00:31:00] was a little too, uh, heated, but a generally peaceful mass protest across the country, right? Hundreds of thousands of people every Saturday night for, you know, 30, 40 weeks, whatever it is.

And the government paused. Again, I want to keep the personalities out of it, because I think when you mention the personalities, people react. So just look at this government. Leave Israel out of it. This government then pauses and says, Okay, we're going to pause these, this, this agenda, and we're going to regroup, we'll try to have negotiations, whatever.

Then, a few months later, they come back and they say, Okay, we're not going to Um, uh, the second thing I'm going to say, uh, is, uh, I don't know if we've ever talked about this before. Uh, but I think that, uh, how we're going to be able to, you know, um, uh, uh, uh, uh, [00:32:00] So, as I said, the way judges are picked, right?

And selections, right. My only point is, they came back more modestly. And We'll see where that goes by the way. I mean that's gonna have its own process now And we'll see we'll see what what if they try to introduce to deal with the selections issue My only point is if you take Israel out of it and you take some of these complicated personalities out of it This is a healthy.

I mean what I've just described Many countries in the world and many people around the world would say wow, that's a great dynamic and democracy has disagreement even vociferous disagreements. You, you hear all the time now, this is one of my pet peeves, that in America they say, oh, our political language has never been, uh, as vociferous as, as today.

Uh, there's a very funny, uh, a fake ad on YouTube where they take actual statements said by the Federalists versus the Democratic Republicans in the election of 1800 of Jefferson versus Adams. And they have, you know, A black and white grainy picture of John Adams, John [00:33:00] Adams is a hideous character, you know?

And then it says, I'm Thomas Jefferson and I approve this message, you know? And they use the actual language that the two parties said about each other. Now, of course, America actually had a civil war that, you know, half a century, uh, uh, 60 years after that. Democracy is vociferous. And just to pick up on what you said then and compare it to the other moments of debate and division in, in Israel.

from the debate over, uh, reparations, uh, reparations, in other words, receiving German reparations, which is, of course, what, what Begin disliked profoundly about it was the actual word reparations. Yeah, but just for our listeners, this is what I referred to in the introduction, which is 1952, uh, The Israeli government is in negotiations with the West German government about, as you said, reparations.

Uh, I think it was like $300 million or something, um, at a time that [00:34:00] Israel was economically under siege. So the, so the money really mattered. It was a time when Israel was, that was desperately poor. Yeah. And desperately needed money for arms, but it was also called by the Germans, which means making right again, uh, as if, right.

You know, as GaN said, any. Of course, no, no amount of money and couldn't make anything right again. Um, but so, but the debate was, was, was, was massive in Israel and, and, and then there was 15, 000 people turned out to a protest. At a time that the population of Israel was 1. 63 million, so 1, 630, 000 people. 15, 000 people showed up.

Wow, I didn't know those numbers. Yeah, Begin addresses a crowd of 15, 000 people. Right. And, which would have been the equivalent proportionately to a protest of 3 million people in the United States today. 3 million people turning out. And Begin, in that address, calls, and I quote, for the violent overthrow.

of the government. He calls for the violent overthrow of the, of the Ben Gurion government, and then he, he urges the demonstrators to [00:35:00] march towards the Knesset, which at the time was in downtown Jerusalem, and he, and he tells them to stop the debate. Sound familiar? And they, and they start throwing things into the Knesset.

The police had to shut them down. And during, and, and during Begin's premiership, the protester of the Lebanon, regarding the Lebanon war. was killed was, I mean, there was, and then, of course, I think I wouldn't know, but a protester was killed. And there was the you'll recall the pull out from Gaza with Yeah, yeah, protesters.

Um, and so, and the one that that I'm always like hearken back to was was the assassination of Yitzhak Rubin, where I really at the time, um, I mean, I was very, I wasn't living in Israel, but I was very, you know, dialed into Israel. I was very aware of Israel. And I thought, I really remember thinking at the time, is the country going to bounce back from this?

It was one of the most heinous crimes in the history of the country. And there was a sense that part [00:36:00] of the country blamed another part of the country for it, for creating the political environment where there was like an incitement. It was this absolutely horrific act and it's what you're, it was just, it, it, it impacted the entire.

Uh, every, uh, every aspect of how people were feeling and there was that moment at the, at the Rabin funeral where, where Netanyahu at the time was the leader of the opposition and goes up to, you know, comfort, acknowledge, you know, be supportive of, express condolences to Leah Rabin and she brushed him off.

And he was, he was falsely blamed, Netanyahu, because he said in a speech beforehand, I remember watching, he said, he said people, because people were calling the, there were those who had. You know, maybe in the Qur'an, I don't remember exactly, he called him a bogey, he called Rabin a bogey, a traitor. And Emile Netanyahu said, who lo bogeyed, he is not a traitor, who toeh, who toeh begadol, he's making a big mistake, but he's not, he's not, you can't say that.

Um, and so you have that. And so I, I think you have to be careful [00:37:00] about being caught in presentism of, of, uh, you know, one of my favorite quotes, which is in Andrew Roberts biography of Churchill, is that in 19, Uh, I think it was almost a year or maybe a year after Israel had been already created and Britain still, Anthony Eden, a foreign minister, very anti Zionist foreign minister, was still refusing to recognize Israel.

And Churchill was the leader of the opposition there and said, you're probably, he said something I'm not, I can never say it as well as Churchill, but he said something like, your problem is That you're looking at this from the perspective of this moment, he says, the birth of a Jewish state in the Holy Land is, is can only be seen as something within the span of not just 100 years, but thousands of years, a Jewish state has just been born in the Holy Land, after thousands of years, how, and you're just treating it like as, you know, as if it's some political, political dust up.

And we can't, yeah. Let [00:38:00] our awe at the accomplishment and the continuous flourishing of a Jewish democracy to be diminished by the flaws in society. However, however challenging some people in one part of the spectrum might find that now to give the The, the ones, those who are most amped right now, they're due.

They would argue, uh, organizers of the protests, many of them would argue that what is coming to a head here is a fundamental different, difference in vision for the future of the country that if it cannot be resolved, if it cannot be reconciled. The Zionist enterprise, as we've known at least for the last 75 years, is not sustainable.

Before you, before you nod your head. That is to say, some subset of Before I shake my head. Yeah. Before you, before you jump in. Sorry. Uh, some subset of the population, uh, basically doesn't contribute to the economy and is [00:39:00] subsidized by the state, by the taxpayer. That same subset of the population doesn't serve in the military, uh, and Um, the burden on this other subset of the population is enormous, both in terms of sacrifice for the security of the state and for the financial well being of the state.

And that burden is only growing as the ultra Orthodox population is growing. And it's, it's not sustainable. It's not sustainable. And that's really what they're reacting to. And then you get into some of the rhetoric of Ben Gvir and Smoltrich and some of the kind of that. There is some real seeming incitement in what they say about.

Arabs and Palestinians and even non, even, uh, non religious Jews. And so the situation is just getting so hot that either the temperature needs to come down or it's, it's going to get too hot and kind of spiral out of control. Again, this is their argument. I just wanted to give them their due. So I think [00:40:00] precisely if you are exercised about a subject, Whatever your view is about this subject, you have to be very careful not to be too extreme or to draw inappropriate historical comparisons.

When three days before the ninth of Av, Tisha B'Av, the day when Jews mourn not just the destruction of the two temples, but of the greatest tragedies in Jewish history throughout Jewish history, when the law on reasonableness was passed, and you had people, including prominent people, passing around the meme online that said, Shisha B'Av, the 6th of Av.

In other words, as if this is another 9th of Av, another Tisha B'Av. You can believe it's a terrible mistake to, to, to vote for this law. But limiting the, a democratic vote, limiting the ability of judges to step in regarding the reasonableness or [00:41:00] unreasonableness of administrative decisions, is not akin to what we mark on Tisha B'Av.

On Tisha B'Av, we mark the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, the expulsion of the Jews from England, which one concluded on that day, around that day, and one was decreed on that day. We mark the destruction of the two temples. And we remember all the tragedies from the first destruction of the temple, and all the great losses, and all the horrific evils that we have, that has been directed against us through the Holocaust.

You cannot compare, you cannot compare this event, however misguided you think that vote might have been, if you think it was misguided, uh, to those events. But, okay, I agree, however, but let me just say, I Of course. But. But they are doing that. But it's not really about the reasonableness clause. You ask most of these people in the protest movement, what is this reasonableness clause?

If you say to them, do you realize that it's only been used 10 times in the last 15 years or [00:42:00] something? It's not about the reasonableness clause. So that brings me to the next point. I mean, it's like the reasonableness clause was like the match. That brings me to the next point. Which is, if you, if, One of the central lessons, if you really are worried about internecine conflict, what you really have to be careful about is demonizing a group of people that are a member of the Jewish people with whom you disagree.

Or to say, as I've seen it said in print, that the government represents those that really don't contribute to Israel.

I mean, you're talking about a vast array of parties that represent all sorts of different members of, of, of the Israeli electorate. [00:43:00] Uh, and I, and I'm not here to, to debate the, the place of and, uh, uh, uh, the place of and contribution to Israeli society regarding the Haredim. That's not the discussion we're going to have today.

But I do want to have it at some point. Okay. Okay. Okay. But. I mean, the language has been, not even, and the language or depictions that have been utilized about Haredim has, has been extreme. You're taking an entire swath of people and, and you're just painting with a broad brush. The seminal moment in, in maybe the most famous speech in Israeli election history.

It was Topaz speech, uh, which, uh, uh, was a moment in his re election campaign versus, versus Paris, uh, where at a Paris rally, uh, Dudu Topaz, whose life ended in very tragic circumstances, but was at that moment an [00:44:00] Israeli, prominent Israeli entertainer. And he got up and said something like, our side.

Meaning, the Paris voters. We have the officers in the army. He says, the voters for Likud are Lefakhot Shin Gimelem He says, and they're at most security guards. And then he used the, the the ethnic slur Chach Chachim which is an ethnic slur making fun of the way Moroccan Jews spoke Hebrew. And Begin in his very famous This, uh, response spoke about two, uh, Jews that had fought in the resistance against the British.

One Sephardi and one Ashkenazi who died in each other's arms in British prison. And then he famously said, he said, Ashkenazi, Iraqi, and Ashkenazi, Iraqi, Yehudim, lochamim, achim, Jews, warriors, brothers. And then the crowd goes, Begin, Begin. But the point is, [00:45:00] it, and he, but here's the thing. This wasn't just a show for him.

He chose to be buried next to those two people. Not to be buried on Mount Herzl, next to the statesmen, but on the Mount of Olives, next to these two young Jewish men from two different sides of the earth who had, who had died in each other, whose families at least were from two different sides of the earth, who had died in each other's arms.

And so, you can, Express concern about the future of Israeli society, but surely the lesson of Menachem Begin's life, and Menachem Begin is invoked, interestingly, by all sides now. Oh, I know. That's what's so interesting to me, and I think something that Begin would be surprised by. He's the great liberal now.

Whatever lesson you want to draw, you can make whatever argument you want to make. But surely the lesson from Menachem Begin's life is that you never demonize or even paint with too broad a brush one group of Jews. Okay but to be clear, I just want I mean in the interest of [00:46:00] balance, it's coming in both directions.

I mean some of the rhetoric coming out of some members of the government about those critical of What the government is doing is, is using equally toxic, if not even more toxic language. I'm, I'm fully willing to reject all forms of demonization, uh, and of all, of all painting with a broad brush when it, political rhetoric is going to be at times hot, hot and over the top.

But there's, it, it, and it's going to be filled with exaggeration and hyperbole. But it's one thing when you use hyperbole about a policy position, or even about political opponents. But if you take one specific group, an ethnic group, or a religious group, and paint with too broad a brush, that's, that, that can, that can, that can end up leading to That's, that's something that Menachem Begin never did.

Menachem Begin used hyperbole once, you know, at [00:47:00] important moments in his life. He was a, he was a, he, he, and he spoke in extreme, in extreme, in extreme tones, in extreme tones at different points. Menachem Begin wouldn't even criticize the government when he was in the position, when he was outside Israel.

And he never ever took a specific, one of, a group of people and spoke in a way that made it sound as if he thought himself superior to them. And that's different, I think. And I'm not saying that only one side is guilty in any way. I'm just saying that's the lesson that Menachem Begin learned from the internecine conflicts of the Jewish past.

You, you said And you wrote this piece in commentary, which you referenced without naming, but it's excellent. We'll post it in the show notes about the overuse or the, or the inappropriate use of the Tisha B'Av historical reference or metaphor. You also hear the reference point to the Yom Kippur War now, the 1973 war, that some Israelis say they've never felt, the last time they felt this vulnerable [00:48:00] was the Yom Kippur War.

I honestly don't understand that. So let's talk about. Um, the second internecine conflict, uh, and its lessons. And then within that, with that in mind, let's, we'll turn back to the, to the Yom Kippur War. The Hasmonean family, today we're known as, uh, wrongly, inaccurately, but nevertheless popularly as the Maccabees.

Fought a war against the Seleucid Empire and then ultimately, not under the, in the age of Judah the Maccabee, whose name really was Judah the Maccabee, but soon after that, uh, took political, uh, turned themselves into a monarchical family and, uh, As I note in my book, Providence and Power, uh We talked about an introduction.

You should go on Amazon or Barnes Noble tonight. Or wait for the movie, where Brad Pitt plays Mary Sullivage. Uh, [00:49:00] and, and, uh, as I write in the book, uh, they, they ended up taking on aspects of the very Greek culture that the family had originally risen to oppose. Uh, and, uh, at certain points they turned against the masses, uh, and shut themselves off from the, the people of, at the time would be called Judea, uh, or Yehudah, Judeans, uh, perhaps.

I mean, uh, so, uh, they shut themselves off from them. Then reigned one great queen, uh, that's who has a chapter in my book, Shlom Tzion. And then following her death, there was a civil war between her two, uh, sons, Aristobulus and Hyrcanus. Now, people note this split as being the end of the, the beginning of the end of the independent Jewish kingdom.

But why, Dan? [00:50:00] What actually happened? What happened, Dan, was that one of the sides, in the midst of the actual, this was an actual battle, in the midst, had it just been a civil war, it would have been horrible, Jewish sovereignty would have endured. But in the midst of this battle, one side decided to seek the support of an outside power in order to, in order to advance their own position.

So they allied with The Roman triumvirate. And Pompey, who is, along with Caesar, a part of the Roman triumvirate, Pompey came into Jerusalem. And that was the beginning of Roman control over Jerusalem. Now, thank God, two points, thank God, as you've mentioned several times, there isn't War, violent conflict.

This is protests and, and democratic debate. [00:51:00] Also, thank God, and I can't stress this enough, the United States of America is not Rome. But it is very strange to me to see the very same people citing that story of the civil war between the Maccabean brothers, then deliberately seeking, effectively, American lobbying and intervention.

In a debate that has taken place in an independent, sovereign Jewish state.

America, of course, is an incredible friend of Israel, for a variety of reasons that are worth, that are worth marking, and especially as we approach the 50th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War, because what needs to be marked is the 50th anniversary not just of the war, from which there are a lot of lessons, but also from Operation Nickelgrass.

Where Nixon saved Israel. Nixon, at the time when his [00:52:00] entire life was crashing around him. Middle of Watergate. Middle of Watergate. And Kissinger and Schlesinger are trying to figure out, How do we get them the arms without it being a direct? Maybe we drop them off in the Azores and Israel picks it up there.

And, and Nixon says, You get those bleeping planes in the air. Send everything that flies. And so we should be marking the moment that America saved Israel from its enemies. And Menachem Begin, since we turn to him again and again, in a very famous, there's a very famous scene where Carter, uh, was visiting after the signing of the Camp David Accords, and there was tension about how it would actually be carried out.

And Carter actually met with Begin's cabinet and maybe the, uh, the, and he, he got some resistance from some members of Begin's cabinet and Carter said something like, you will do this. You will do what I'm telling you to do. And Begin, who probably wished that his ministers had not spoken the [00:53:00] way they did, nevertheless turned to Carter and said, we are an independent, sovereign, proud Jewish country.

We will choose to do what we think is right. It's incredible to me. To see, I, I I I, I, I happen to see that, uh, during, uh, uh, uh, one point during Rishi Sun's Prime Minister's questions. He was asked about, uh, the episode of Pakistan, where one of their previous leaders was arrested. I wrote about this in the journal, um, and they said, you know, what do you, what do you, what's the British.

position on this. He's like, it's an eternal matter, he says. I thought to myself, how many more millions of people does Pakistan have than Israel? Israel has nine and some million people, and everybody seems To think that it's, that it's in their position to comment on a domestic dispute. It is a dispute, but it is a domestic [00:54:00] dispute.

And so it's very strange to me, and I emphasize again, America, thank God, is not Rome. But it's very strange to me that those, at times, who are seeking to mark and reflect some 75 years of independent Jewish sovereignty, cite The story of the Maccabean Civil War and then, if not in the very same breath, soon after that, ask for the pressure placed on Israel from outside powers.

That's a little ironic. And it's a reminder that we need to look, when we're studying an episode, we can't just evoke one element of the episode. We can't just say, well, it's split under Solomon. Yes, but why did it? And maybe that story actually gives us something to celebrate today. Why did it, what happened in the story of the second temple?

If we study that, I think we find that there's actually, for [00:55:00] all of the issues and all of the challenges, challenges discussed in your wonderful book, along with the incredible strength visual discussion of the book, but for all of the challenges, there's So much to celebrate for Jews around the world about Israel, some 75 years into its history.

And thank God for the many millions of non Jews around the world that are inspired by the story of the Jewish state. I will say when I Um, even though I don't, I disagree with some of the rhetoric and I disagree with some of their positions. I, I have been inspired by the protest movement because it is a, because it is an expression of a people care about their country and are invested in their country and are, and are in the game.

Within a country, part, a central part of democracy is the right to protest. Protest is not the same thing as coming to America. So let's, first of all, I think that's a fringe element. Telling Biden to I don't think that's [00:56:00] most of the people turning out. I'm not they're just not contemplating what America should do or shouldn't do Well, you do hear prominent Israelis telling American Jews not to meet with not to meet with Netanyahu, right?

Right, but the democratically elected Yossi Klein Helevy on here a week ago at the mine who I don't know if you listen to the conversation sitting right where you're sitting now and he said I pushed him on this, and he said Jewish organizations in the U. S. should meet with the Prime Minister and the government.

He said they should. They should, yeah. But others have said they shouldn't. I know. I'm just saying. So I think that, and that, sure, they should express their concerns if they wanted, but it should be done privately, at least he was referring to AIPAC. But, uh, I'm just saying that, that you watch this protest movement and you watch the, the weekend of the vote of the reasonableness clause, the march from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem where you had hundreds of thousands of people, 95 degree heat marching.

And I spoke to a British reporter who's based in Israel, prominent British reporter who said, I'm [00:57:00] optimistic about Israel when I see this, like even its critics, its internal critics are not just shrugging their shoulders and saying. You know, I'm giving up on this place. They're like invested. They're in it.

They're so I know we both love Dan I think you mentioned in your book the wonderful video of The escalators the escalators. Yeah, did you describe this on the podcast? Yeah, so But it's in the book. It's in the book. It's in the author's note. So Speaking of someone who read the author's note, like, like, like five minutes after he wrote it.

Yes, I'm not waiting for the movie. I'm reading the book as everybody listening should. Uh, and, uh, and barnesandnoble. com or other, or other website. Or other e commerce site. Or wherever books are sold. Um, but just to summarize it. You had Protesters had come from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem to protest the government.

You had, uh, Jews from the Jerusalem area and beyond going from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv to support, to do a [00:58:00] protest supporting the government. Then they met on, if you've taken, Miraculous. Miraculous, and I wrote an article in the Washington Journal about the miracle of the Israeli train. If you've taken the Miraculous train at the Navon train station in Jerusalem, you have to go up and down these vast, these vast escalators.

People going to take the train. People, people going to train to Tel Aviv, going down, they had come from protesting the government and people returning to Jerusalem on the same train and they're passing each other and they are shaking hands, right? I love you. And I saw that. Yeah, I don't know if I immediately texted you, Dan.

Uh, but whenever something like this comes up, I immediately text you because I know that we both have a deep optimism about the country. So that image is very powerful and we read about it in the author's note. I'm not, I don't, I don't want to provide too much detail, but it's, it's very dramatic and it's what gives us hope and we hope even though people will remember this period is a very difficult time, they [00:59:00] will also remember the images like that.

And there are many of them. You and I have talked a lot about a lot of them, not just in general, not just the escalator scene at the train station. And that's why we chose to open the book, um, with that. with that story. Just before we go, because I know we got to go, unlike many synagogue sermons, which I can now watch online, I wasn't able to watch your Spanish Portuguese synagogue sermon.

Can you just briefly, because, because we're pressed here for time, uh, briefly tell me what you spoke about in your sermon. Certainly. Uh, so my sermon, I, I gave two, one is on the first day and one is on the second day, but uh, the, the first one was inspired by an incredibly striking lacuna that in at least many traditional synagogues will exist, uh, that at least in many traditional synagogues existed, uh, this Rosh Hashanah, because on the first day of Rosh Hashanah, There's no show.

There was no chauffeur that comes out on Shabbat. We don't blow chauffeur on Shabbat, so we only blow chauffeur on the second day. So you have the central [01:00:00] element of, of what defines Rosh Hashanah for us. Uh, is, is the shofar and it's missing. And, uh, that's what's called in our, in our, in our, uh, liturgy, Zichron Torah, that it's a day not of the sounding of the shofar, but of remembering the sounding of the shofar.

So, uh, I was inspired by a fascinating story in a fascinating book. Uh, that, uh, truly tells us the memory of what someone did for you, and especially the memory of the sound of what somebody did for you, can change your entire life. So just to give you, very briefly, do you know, Dan, a, uh, an entrepreneur, an inventor by the name of Sanford Greenberg?

No. Okay. So, just very briefly to give you his story, and he wrote a memoir whose name, whose, the title of which I'll reveal soon. Sanford Greenberg comes to Columbia. In the 60s. [01:01:00] And, uh, he meets another student there, another Jewish student, whose name is Arthur Garfunkel. And, uh, they both love singing. And they would sing, like, Jewish songs together, because, and they would sing, uh, Jewish prayers together, etc.

Then Sanford Greenberg, I think because of a misdiagnosed glaucoma, began to go blind. Uh, and he thought he would have to leave Columbia forever. And his friend, Arthur Garfunkel, uh, said to him, you know, please come, I'll help you, I'll help you through college. And he would read to him, and he would also sing, like, prayers to him, like a chazam.

Uh, because he knew that he'd grown up with these, with these prayers, and he would sing them to him. Uh, and his nickname for himself, Arthur Garfunkel's nickname for himself, was Darkness. And he said, uh, okay, Darkness is going to read for you now. And so he knew at this point Garfunkel only as a voice, not as a, [01:02:00] and at tough times he would stand next to him.

And he would sing prayers in their Columbia dorm. So Alfred Greenberg concludes Columbia. He ends up in, I think, inventing an important part of the computer system that's on Apollo 11, the moon landing, uh, and becomes an immensely successful, uh, inventor and entrepreneur. But before he achieved massive success, I think he got a Rhodes scholarship, some other scholarship, uh, uh, double check what the exact scholarship was, but he goes to London and he had met his wife and he's married in London, but he has, he has no money yet.

And he had always thought that his friend, Arthur Garfunkel, had studied architecture, was going to become an architect. And he was excited because he thought Arthur Garfunkel would be a great architect. Arthur Garfunkel, he writes this in his book, he says, I want to go back to music and, you know, start a group again with my friend Paul from high school.

And [01:03:00] I need 400 to cut a record. Sanford Greenberg had, uh, 435 in his account. But he says, effectively, because of his memory of Garfunkel's voice. And what it meant to him and what he had done for him. He would do anything for him. And that's, of course, how Simon Garfunkel came into being. Really? Yeah, well, that record.

I mean, ultimately. That's the origin story? Uh, origin story, yeah. Now, Simon wrote this song, The Sounds of Silence, not Garfunkel. Right. But, that said. Sanford Greenberg built, in his memoir built around the story, gives his memoir the greatest title ever, which is Hello Darkness, My Old Friend. Um, and at its heart, it's a story of, we call Rosh Hashanah Yom Hazikaron, the day of memory.

And especially on a day where the sound is missing. It's a day of remembering the sound. And often the memory of a sound in [01:04:00] your life can be even more powerful than the sound itself. Because it calls up the impact of a moment that previously occurred. And it can drive you and inspire you in ways that That, that the sound itself in the moment might not.

And it's also, of course, a, a, a reminder to us that the impact we have on others can redound through their memory, uh, in ways far beyond our imaginings. And so, uh, on the, on the first day of Rosh Hashanah, I didn't give a state of the Jewish people. Uh, thank God I have other Uh, outlets, uh, I get to write monthly in commentary and, and, and, and, and, and come to, uh, call me back with Dan Senor to talk about some of the most controversial issues of our time.

Uh, and, uh, you know, even though I only came here cause I thought I was here to reflect on, uh, the inflation issue and on the future of the Democratic and Republican primary. [01:05:00] Uh, and I was shocked that this is the subject we ended up discussing. Um, but, uh, fine, I know it's Muhammad Ali on as a Jets fan, I'm from Chicago, I, you know, I don't, I don't have to like it, but that's how it is.

Mike Gallagher, I have people on who don't agree with me about football either. I know, and I know you're a big fan of the 1985 Bears, so that's, so. I love the 1985 Bears. So, so by the way, the 85 bears are Walter Payton's chronology. Yeah. And Michael Payton and Jim McMahon is interesting. Mike Singletary.

Mike Singletary is great. But Jim McMahon is interesting because if you look at the bears, they had a great running game. They had a phenomenal world class defense defense. They had a good, decent second teams. They didn't have a great quarterback. Jim McMahon was very charismatic figure, but he actually wasn't a great Joe Montana.

That's the reason you and me, Dan, you, actually analyze the stats. I just remember his awesome headband. Great headband. Great. And the Super Bowl shuffle. And he was, he was so cool. Yeah, and the fridge. I mean, this is a great William Perry, of course, the fridge. But, but there is a world in which the Jets have all those [01:06:00] elements, now minus a quarterback, that you see the Bears in 85 86.

You see the Ravens, similar in 2000. And do they have a Mike Ditka, though? Do they have a Mike Ditka? Robert Sala? Absolutely. I'm just asking. I don't know. Yes, I mean, the question answers itself. Rabbi Zoloveitchik, we are going to leave it there. I want to wish you and your family a wonderful, wonderful New Year.

A year of blessing and joy, Dan. Thank you. Same to you. And thank you always for Spirited Conversation. We will have you back on, maybe to talk about your, your Yom Kippur, uh, I'm going to be talking about your Colney Dray sermon, which I know you haven't written yet. And we will have you back on because I do want to pick back up on your book, which I talked about in the show, in the introduction.

And I specifically want to talk about some of these characters that you and I have talked about at live events we've done that weren't recorded, but I thoroughly enjoyed and I want to open up to our listeners. So that's an early invitation. To return soon and, uh, Shana Tova. Shana Tova, Dan. Thank you so much.[01:07:00]

That's our show for today. To keep up with Mayor Soloveitchik's work, you can find him at mayorsoloveitchik. com, including links to his podcast, and you should order his book, Providence and Power. And as a reminder, please today go pre order your copy of Mai and Saul's new book, The Genius of Israel, The Surprising Resilience of a Divided Nation in a Turbulent World, and you will get the chapter sampler that deals specifically with some of the issues we talked about today, which will be helpful history for you to have at your fingertips when you have heated discussions in the days and weeks ahead, and just send the receipt from your book order.

to book at dan senor dot com. That's book at dan senor dot com and we will send you the sampler as a pdf right away. Call Me Back is produced by Ilan Benatar. Until next time, I'm your host, Dan Senor.[01:08:00]