A message for religious (and all) Jews

Resulting from the genocide, much to my surprise I went back to reading from the Talmud – Penguin Classics publish a nice selection in 822 pages. And (please don’t shout at me for the next) I’ve gone back to reading Israel Shahak firstly at the sadly long defunct Matzpen here https://matzpen.org/english/1981-10-10/the-jewish-religion-and-its-attitude-to-non-jews-part-3-israel-shahak/ The Jewish Religion and its Attitude to Non Jews. And another look at his books. And I came away thinking, Now I understand how and why the fascist Israeli government ministers are acting as they do, and feeling (dare I say) even virtuous about it; nod with recognition at the pep talks the ethnonationalist rabbis give the IDF – of which the Amalek references are only a part. And Joshua and Canaanites. OK so all religions are pick-and-choose. “Our Jewish values” — but WHICH values? Some very expurgated ones it seems, ones that fit with the secular writings that came with the Enlightenment (even if that has proven to have fallen far short with the failure of western civilisation to keep humanity on the straight and narrow). Maybe I got it all wrong, maybe Shahak was all that his critics said and worse. Maybe I got the wrong Talmud or the wrong commentaries. But maybe not? If the best of contemporary adherents to Judaism pick its nice bits, and there are nice bits, have the worst picked what we now call the very worst? Medieval Judaism versus its modern progressive varieties? A good, now sadly late, friend (who’d long ago been part of the Haganah) once remarked to me, “I don’t know, am I Jewish at all?” To maladapt Groucho’s famous quip, is that a club I’d even think for a moment of joining if I’d been given the chance? Danny Kaye might be better — would I rather be a [name a happier species than human here]?

I deeply respect what you write Dr Kory and yes, Hugo Gryn was indeed great, I remember his participation in those BBC radio programmes, The Moral Maze. Your post reminded me, incidentally, of Penderecki’s “Threnody” which I often think of after watching some AlJazeera news bulletin, although it wasn’t written to memorialise the Shoah.