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Volume 10 Issue 3   November 2015Kislev 5776

Torah Delights


If Science is True


If science is true, then all the matter in the universe popped out of nothing fourteen billion years ago, all 150 billion galaxies-worth, in a moment. Yet some say, in the name of “science,” that there can be no God.

 

Why say that? Because, they argue, there is “no evidence” of Him in the Universe! They regard the Creation of the Universe from nothingness, in a flash, as being somehow non-miraculous. It couldn’t involve a conscious being, or Being, causing it, because, they assume, there is no God.

 

How can a doctrine like that be called “scientific”?

 

- By Dr. Robert E. Buxbaum, with Michael Dallen (Prof. Buxbaum, a Professional Engineer, is a First Covenant Foundation director-trustee.)

 

Abraham, Prince of HaShem

 

Dimitar K., a Noahide gentleman from Bulgaria, was speaking of the Bible’s Abraham:

 

“Abraham wasn’t Jewish. There was, as yet, no such thing as Jewish. But Abraham is the father of every ivri [person from the “other side”], isn’t he? Of everyone who “walks with HaShem,” despite the  common practices and conventions of the larger world, a man from “the other side,” the “other way.””

 

We responded: Yes. Abraham is the daddy of every contrary cuss who loves HaShem.

 

“So if God gives knowledge to man according to his attitude to his fellow, then “Lech lecha” [Genesis 12:1, God’s first words to Abraham] becomes more clear: “Go! Be righteous. That is, be fully human. Care for your neighbor, your brother-human, made in God’s Image, with kindness and charity and tender concern, if only for your own good. Give tzedakah/charity – if only to elevate yourself, to improve yourself. Literally, “Go for yourself!” Lech lecha.”

 

Yes. Abraham’s departed from the “normal” human outlook, pre-judging one’s fellow soul with envious negativity or disparaging scorn or resentment. Instead, he incarnates a generalized benign outlook. And this is what makes him. By looking for God in man, like Abraham, one crosses to the “other side,” of blessing and being blessed, like Abraham. How good it is to do this! How soul-enriching! How transforming!

 

 

Soul Warping

 

Following the Paris, Beirut, and Hebron attacks by vicious Muslims against innocent civilians, let us comment:

 

Dear Da’esh (ISIS, or ISIL), Al-Qaeda, and all you jihadis, and you who admire the jihadis, and all the violent Jew-haters:

 

You damn yourselves. Your hatred comes from blind, fact-indifferent passion and reckless dis-logic. It cripples you. It makes you stupid. You are models of what our father Abraham WASN’T.

 

The “Palestinian” claim that the Jewish Nation has no legitimate connection to the Land of Israel, is really stupid. By subscribing to such a stupid belief, by ignoring all the facts and all the history that contradict it, you make yourselves more stupid, and make the truth your enemy.

 

Do you think this makes you MORE loved by God?

 

 

Torah Delights

 

We’ve warned so much about false Torah-teachers - we need to speak up for the true ones.

 

We ourselves are all big consumers of Torah teaching. We love it. We get Torah tapes – CD’s, actually – from distinguished rabbis and other Torah teachers; we read Torah commentaries every day; we study the Bible, or some aspect of Torah, every day, every week … Not to brag, God forbid: this is simply what one does as a follower and – we hope – conscious servant of HaShem.

 

One picks up the most awesome learning – delightful insights into Scripture, world and Jewish history, morality, ethics, philosophy, the Way of the Universe and the Path of HaShem, clearer, deeper, sharper appreciation of HaShem Himself… Most non-Jews have absolutely no idea of the incredible riches of wisdom and knowledge available to the conscious servant of HaShem.

 

Superb commentaries and Torah teachings flow from the Jewish People constantly, every day, like water through a fire hose … If only we had somebody to help us direct part of this flow specifically to Noahides, to help B’nei Noah cultivate and satisfy love of Torah….

 

Noahides have their own needs and special areas to study, somewhat apart from the Jews’. Certain subjects aren’t appropriate for every Noahide. So a filter for such things – like, say, the Torah details of ritual laws and customs that don’t obligate Noahides – would be useful.

 

Obviously, not everything purporting to be Torah – Divine Guidance – is true and whole and accurate. This problem is especially acute in Noahide studies, involving the Derech HaShem [The Path of HaShem]for mankind.

 

You may have been contacted by one of the Noahide-outreach outfits that exist on the Internet. (Incidentally, almost none of them speak well of us. Apparently, we don’t take their work sufficiently seriously.)

 

Most of these people come from or affiliate in some way with the same Jewish sect: Chabad Lubavitch. Unfortunately, we regard many of their teachings to be false and defamatory when it comes to the Noahide Way. The King of the Universe, the blessed Holy One, never cursed Noahides with the horrible laws and the degraded, second-class citizenship that these folks claim.

 

We honor our colleagues’ sincerity, piety, and the honesty of their feelings - even while they reject all we’ve got to say. Indeed, it would be odd if, when it comes to God’s Way, there weren’t contention among “experts.” But they are wrong and we aren’t when we insist that: 1) Noahides need to determine the details of their own laws for themselves; 2) the vast corpus of national, “non-Jewish” law that appertains to every human nation, state and government isn’t necessarily unworthy; and 3) the Way of God – God’s System, for the nations - is infinitely more loving, sensible, kindly and ACCESSIBLE than they’re teaching.

 

We’ve been fighting this fight so long... Picking the most dully conventional, supposedly “traditional” interpretations of assorted Torah dicta and basing your decrees upon them, does not make you authoritative.

 

For now, let us just emphasize this one point: A Noahide who celebrates the Sabbath is NOT a sinner. Yes, Israel stands in a different relation to the miracle of Shabbos than do non-Jews – it’s a dual celebration for the Jews, commemorating the miracles of Egypt, that freed the Jews from slavery, as well as THE great human celebration, commemorating the right to be human and the gift of dominion over planet Earth – but it still exists to celebrate the One and Only God. Everyone who regards it in that light should know enough to try to enjoy it in some manner.

 

The one who first put this idea into our heads, as it happens, was the highly “traditional” Jewish commentator Rashi. (Commentary on the Talmud, Yevamot 48b. On this subject generally, see Rainbow Covenant, pp. 127-28.)

 

The Sabbath is for everyone who follows HaShem, the Holy One and Only Deity, to enjoy -  as the Torah teaches - “with happiness and a full heart.” That doesn’t mean “keeping it” with all the celebrations and restrictions that the Jews bring to it. But why should it? By excluding Noahides from every Sabbath blessing, based on a thoughtlessly expansive reading of the conventional theoretical prohibition against “goyim keeping Shabbos [exactly as a Jew does],” these Noahide “authorities” fail.

 

By Michael Dallen

 





We call on God for help. As the prayer that Israel says every morning just before reciting the Hebrew statement of faith known as the shema asks (please understand that this is much richer in Hebrew than in English): Our Father, the merciful Father, Who acts mercifully, have mercy on us, instill in our hearts to understand and elucidate, to listen, learn, teach, safeguard, perform and fulfill all the words of Your Torah's teachings with love. Enlighten our eyes in Your Torah, attach our hearts to Your commandments, and unify our hearts to love and fear Your Name. Amen.

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