וללב מלכים אין חקר
“There is no way to plumb the depths of the hearts of kings.”
Proverbs 25:3
by Rabbi Jeremy Rosen
The Biblical books of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes have plenty of negative statements about rulers. That they are fickle, cannot be trusted, misuse their power and can’t be relied on to be just or honest. Yet rulers of any kind have existed for millennia and doubtless will go on existing. We need someone to be in charge. To hope that they will do a good job. Anyone who has read anything I’ve written over the years will know I do not trust politicians. Although I agree, some of them have proven to be more successful and effective than others.
If you look at the list of kings of Judea and Israel during the first Temple or the Maccabees during the second, the balance between good and bad rulers is roughly even. But the disasters that led to the destruction of the first and the second temples were caused by poor or corrupt leadership. Just read the books of the prophets to confirm their assessment of the times in which they lived and the rulers that they had to engage with or run away from.
One of the great advantages of democracy is that every now and again you can change your ruler, and if you don’t like what he or she has done, you can give somebody else a chance to see if they can do a better job. Even if democracy is a very problematic form of government, by and large, in the West, for all its faults, we prefer it to autocracy, dictatorship and the arbitrary cruelty of men who put themselves above all else.
All this is a background to my comments on the election of Donald Trump. He is not known for being a particularly moral or a likable person. But I have a come across many people who expressed joy at the prospect of a change of political leadership in the United States of America. Not so much because they approve of Trump as a person, but because they strongly disapprove of the alternative.
We’ve gone through a period commonly called woke. Where a range of values, some laudable others plain stupid or crazy, and dogmas based on misguided academically pseudo research, have bulldozed their way to the top of the national agenda and have tried to impose disturbing ideologies on the rest of the country. Most of the Colleges of the USA have become breeding grounds for bigotry, anti-Semitism and inverted racism, are overprotecting entitled teaching and student bodies. Even if some of their aims have been laudable. Attempts to compromise have failed. Leaving the USA divided into warring camps, self-interested, despising each other and preventing reconciliation. Particularly relevant here in New York. I do not reject most Democrats or their policies. There is much I can identify with. But the constant harassing, bullying, humiliating of Trump, seemed so petty and vindictive, I felt repelled rather than comforted.
This, more than anything else, has been responsible for what some see as a catastrophe. But in fact, it has been a revolt against intellectual and indulged elites. Only time will tell what Trump’s policies will be. Who knows? He is changeable. His advisers are changeable. His relationships are changeable. He can blow hot and cold. Support you one minute and undermine you the next. He has made friends with evil people ( what politicians have not) and with good people. And it’s not just in America. The European press and media are stupidly vindictive, and alarmist and like to call him a Nazi).
America has taken the lead culturally, academically, and philosophically in the woke revolution. But much of Europe has adopted many of these puerile woke theories or has accepted the naïve, appeasing Obama mentality that if you’re nice to your enemies they will do the right thing and back down. Which neither Russia, North Korea, Syria nor Iran paid any attention to. We don’t know whether Trump will reverse this. But repeating failed policies can only be the recipe for madness. Current American policies have failed in the attempt to impose democracy on countries simply not prepared for it. And in appeasing violent regimes and tolerating that cesspit of hatred called the United Nations. There has to be a change. Will it come now?
I am biased. We are all biased in one way or another. Loyal to families, to cultures, to ideologies, and we are pretty resistant to challenges and criticism. Only occasionally do we change course. The beauty of the human condition is that we are different, and we do not all conform to the same ideals and values, and we can change. But change like the tide comes in and goes out. This after all is a theme that runs right through the Bible and history. Nothing is static.
I care for my family. I care about what happens to Israel and Jews. I take this into consideration when I think about what kind of country and what people I want to live my life amongst. And I am just as disturbed by the differences that exist in my Jewish world as in the outside world.
I have watched with despair the way so many in the United States of America have turned against us Jews in so many places and groups. Will Trump change this? I don’t know. I wouldn’t bet on it. Let’s see how it turns out. If you are unhappy, you can vote for a Marxist next time! The end of the Republic? Don’t be so dramatic. America is made up of very different people. It is only right that different voices get their turn to see if they can do better.
I do care about the world. I want to love my neighbors.
As the English poet John Donne (White, Colonial, Male no less!! said (extract): “No man is an island…Any man’s death diminishes me, Because I am involved in mankind. And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee."
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Jeremy Rosen was born in Manchester, England, the eldest son of Rabbi Kopul Rosen and Bella Rosen. Rosen's thinking was strongly influenced by his father, who rejected fundamentalist and obscurantist approaches in favour of being open to the best the secular world has to offer while remaining committed to religious life. He was first educated at Carmel College, the school his father had founded based on this philosophical orientation. At his father's direction, Rosen also studied at Be'er Yaakov Yeshiva in Israel (1957–1958 and 1960). He then went on to Merkaz Harav Kook (1961), and Mir Yeshiva (1965–1968) in Jerusalem, where he received semicha from Rabbi Chaim Leib Shmuelevitz in addition to Rabbi Dovid Povarsky of Ponevezh and Rabbi Moshe Shmuel Shapiro of Yeshivat Be'er Ya'akov. In between Rosen attended Cambridge University (1962–1965), graduating with a degree in Moral Sciences.