Worst. Dvar Torah. Ever.
Daryl Temkin at The Conservative Voice gets top honors for scribing the most absurd and politically skewed “modern” interpretation of the Exodus story ever written.
The “progressive” slaves hated Moses’ freedom campaign because they saw it as disruptive to Egypt, and a justification for anti-Jewish protests. The progressive intellectual slaves proclaimed Moses to be a stupid stutterer who couldn’t even pronounce basic words. Although all the documents of Egypt consistently pressed for the annihilation of the Jews, the progressives argued that Pharaoh was really benign and had recognized the existence and rights of the Nation of Israel — it was only for political reasons that Pharaoh couldn’t publicly state his recognition.
Two professors from the prestigious Nile University published research which indicated suspicion that the Israelite nation was not politically supportive of Egyptian attitudes and was organizing to achieve its own goals. Progressive slaves quickly argued in favor of continued Jewish enslavement.
What you see as rubbish I see as actually quite humourous. I have no idea if the writer was intending to be satirical or if the piece was written facetiously, but I must admit that it made me smile. Lighten up!
First, you can certainly argue with the analogy to today’s times, but the description itself is straight from the Torah and midrash.
Second, it’s also clear that the analogy _is_ accurate for pre-holocaust Germany. The “progressives” in pre-holocaust Germany were in favor of integration into German society, and were against Zionism because it would cause Jews to be seen as outside the German society. “Berlin is our Jerusalem” was the cry at the time.
Obviously neither the Egypt analogy or the Germany analogy makes all progressives always wrong. Whether the lessons from Egypt or Berlin apply to today’s situation can be debated. But the fact that people in Egypt thought they were right, and that progressives in Germany thought they were right, might make us consider very carefully whether today’s progressives are as right as they think they are.
Wow, talk about a way to stretch an analogy. If you want to take a lesson from the Haggadah and apply it to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, how about writing a Dvar Torah on the way we spill a drop of our wine for each of the ten plagues, to show our sadness for the live that had to be taken to give us our freedom.
This thing is all over the place.
From the part Mobius quoted, I at first thought it was trying to suggest that Egypt was Iraq (home to a “disruptive” “freedom campaign”) and Moses was GW Bush (a “stupid stutterer”).
Then I realized it was really about Israel/Palestine, as the conclusion of the piece makes clear:
I understand (and even agree with) the criticisms of those who push for working with Hamas when Hamas’s stated goal is the ethnic cleansing of Israel. But it’s absurd to draw an analogy between modern “progressive” attitudes toward Palestine in general and ancient don’t-liberate-me slave attitudes toward Pharoah. One can just as easily argue that Moses was the radical “progressive” or “liberal” (pushing to move on to a new, more just society where former slaves would have human rights) and that the slaves who opposed him were the “conservatives” (protective of the status quo and accepted ethnic hierarchies).
Second, the Left’s pro-Palestinian position comes from a desire to end oppression, not accept/prolong it. I oppose acceptance of Hamas, because I agree with the author of the article that if given the upper hand, Hamas would likely treat the Israelis far, far worse than the Israelis have treated them.
But if the Exodus story teaches us anything, it’s that while some people treat you badly, you should still have compassion toward them as human beings. As Alex pointed out, while we remember the Ten Plagues in awe of G-d’s power, we also spill some wine from our cups at the Pesach seder to remember that innocent Egyptians were hurt.