We may not like the idea because we don’t like each other, but we have to come to love each other, or else, we’re in for a civil war. This is where the State of Israel stands today. “Love your neighbor as yourself” has been the motto of the Jewish people since its inception. We were a collection of strangers who came to prize the idea of love of others, and our ancestors practiced it with one another until they vowed to be “as one man with one heart.”
However, if you look at us today, we are very, very far from it, and we are getting even further away. No one has picked up the gauntlet and actually tried to implement this most basic tenet of Judaism. We’ve turned education, which originally meant raising children to become human beings who care about others, into conveying information, either secular or religious, but none that makes people know how to relate to others with kindness and love. As a result, our society has come to the brink of collapse. There is so much hatred among the factions in the country that we might collapse into a civil war, as we had done before, unless we quickly reverse course.
I am saying this not because I am a doomster, but because I want to prevent what is already in the making. Our nation has already come to such a state, and it caused us to lose our country and our freedom, not to mention the horrendous loss of life that mainly we inflicted on ourselves in a bloody civil war. Today, too, we have enemies surrounding us, but today, too, we are our own worst enemies.
Therefore, we have to recognize that unity above all differences is our only option going forward. We will not agree on politics, education, defense, foreign policy, separation of religion from state, or any of the topics that currently divide us. However, we must understand that if we try to destroy our dissenters, we will destroy ourselves. Therefore, if we want to have a future, we have no other choice but to find a way to unite above all the differences, which will remain.
This may not seem possible to achieve, but a civil war is on the other side of unity. If we keep this in mind, perhaps we will find a way. And the first step toward finding that way is realizing the kind of danger that is lurking around the corner. The next step is to sit together and discuss, with open minds, since we have no open hearts, how we can live together nonetheless, so we don’t end up killing one another, with our enemies killing those who will remain.
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