This week's fascinating Torah portion tells the story of the evil King Balak and the prophet Balaam, who is appointed to curse the people of Israel, accepting the assignment reluctantly, but ends up blessing them. Along the way, he is rebuked by an angel for beating his donkey, who sees the angel when he cannot.
One of Balaam's blessings has since been incorporated into the Jewish daily prayers: "How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, your Tabernacles, O Israel."
Balaam is a rare example in the Torah of a person who is not Jewish and yet has an intimate relationship with God, as well as the power of property, even if he is not a moral character -- hinting that faith is both universal and complex.
This week's show will be slightly different from the norm: we'll focus on clips and topics, rather than guests -- and that, hopefully, will mean more input from the callers (unless you are all watching football on opening weekend).
Topics:
- The state of the economy
- The fight against crime
- The midterm election fight
- The struggle for peace between Russia and Ukraine
- The airstrike on the Venezuelan drug cartel
- The attempt to sink Kennedy
- The war in Gaza
- The case against Harvard
- The Trump presidency
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This week's Torah portion includes several laws about conduct in civic and personal life, the common theme of which is boundaries -- setting bounds to what one may do at home, at work, and even in the battlefield.
One noteworthy passage concerns Amalek, the evil nation that attacked the Children of Israel as they made their Exodus from slavery to freedom. Deuteronomy 25:17-19 commands Jews to obliterate Amalek's memory.
The South African government accused Israel of genocide on the basis of a story about Amalek in the Book of Samuel, in which King Saul was commanded to wipe out the entire evil Amalekite nation.
Because Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu quoted this week's portion -- "Remember what Amalek did to you" (25:17), the South African government claimed he was commanding soldiers to commit genocide.
It was an absurd and malevolent misreading of the Bible and of Jewish tradition. The commandment, as observed by Jews today, is to remember the evil of Amalek and fight ...
