Passover 2010 will occur on Tuesday, March 30. It is an ancient Jewish holy day, the first to be mentioned in the Old Testament (Torah). It will last until April 5th and is most associated with the “Seder” or family dinner composed of a number of symbolic items and the reading of the Haggadah, a book of prayers that explains the symbolism of each. The Passover Seder will be celebrated on Monday evening prior to the date of the holy day as per Jewish tradition.
The significance of Passover (Pesach) is the retelling of the story of how God, working through Moses, freed the Jews from Egyptian slavery and set them on their journey to Israel.
Biblical scholars note that Moses had not only murdered an Egyptian guard, but was not a particularly articulate man, so God in effect did not select a saint, but rather a flawed individual. Moses had been spared death as an infant when his mother saved his life by giving him up to fate. Found by an Egyptian princess, he was raised in the house of the pharaoh.
It has been a very long journey for the Jews ever since, finding, building, and losing their homeland, and millennia later, after a deliberate effort to kill the Jews of Europe, reclaiming their homeland to establish a new Jewish state in 1948. They were not welcome.
It is a sad commentary on the rest of mankind that an irrational hatred for Jews has not abated and the lies about them have never ceased.
There has been some consternation of late regarding the signals coming out of the Obama White House concerning its policy toward Israel and such things are not to be lightly dismissed. Israel is a western outpost, albeit a very tiny one, in the Middle East that is hostile to both Jews and Christians, Hindus and Buddhists.
On Passover, things around the White House may be a tad quieter given that Obama will be missing the company of Rahm Emanuel, his chief of staff; David Axelrod his senior advisor; Ronald Klain the chief of staff to the Vice President; Larry Summers his an economic advisor along with Paul Volcker; Tim Geithner his Secretary of the Treasury; and Peter Orszag his head of Budget.
For those who attribute everything to the Jews, it must surely be even more disquieting that, the evening prior to the rude treatment accorded Israeli Prime Minister, Bibi Netanyahu, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee hosted a dinner attended by more than 7,000 of Israel’s friends in Washington, D.C.
To the everlasting confusion of my conservative friends and colleagues, the question of why American Jews are overwhelmingly Democrats and were big donors to the Obama campaign remains a mystery. Obama has given clear evidence of “leaning” toward Muslims in general and favoring the Palestinians in particular.
Raised a Muslim in Indonesia and a parishioner for many years at a Chicago church led by a preacher unsympathetic to America, yet surrounded by Jewish advisors, the phrase “blind faith” comes to mind for those Jews who continue to support Barack Obama.
On January 12th, New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote that “Jews are a famously accomplished group. They make up 0.2 percent of the world population, but 54percent of the world chess champions, 27 percent of the Nobel physics laureates, and 31 percent of the medicine laureates.”
“Jews make up 2 percent of the U.S. population, but 21 percent of the Ivy League student bodies, 26 percent of the Kennedy Center honorees, 37 percent of the Academy Award-winning directors, 38 percent of those on a recent Business Week list of leading philanthropists, (and) 51 percent of the Pulitzer Prize winners for nonfiction.”
It would be a great thing for the world if everyone, Jew, Christian, Hindu, Buddhist, and atheist, sat down to celebrate Passover because a “chosen” people has given so much to the world and received so little thanks in return. You will note I did not include Muslims. Their track record is slim, their animosity to all other faiths is well known, and their current behavior worldwide is drenched in blood.
I leave you with a bit of “Jewish Zen.”
Breathe in. Breathe out.
Breathe in. Breathe out.
Forget this and attaining Enlightenment
will be the least of your problems.
© Alan Caruba, 2010
