{"id":61453,"date":"2019-08-19T16:44:27","date_gmt":"2019-08-19T13:44:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=61453"},"modified":"2023-03-13T15:33:00","modified_gmt":"2023-03-13T13:33:00","slug":"everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-jewish-people-in-one-chapter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-jewish-people-in-one-chapter\/","title":{"rendered":"Everything You Need to Know About the Jewish People \u2013 in One Chapter"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[395,444,434],"acf":{"old_id":"61453","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":33992,"related_cahpter":"288","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"By the end of the book, because of our incompetence, betrayal, disloyalty and venality, we will lose it all. Or almost...","content":"

It\u2019s all right here in the first chapter of the First Book of Kings. Attempts at dynastic control from one generation seeking to manage the future. Contentious claimants to the same throne. Powerless women scheming as the only available mode of influence in a patriarchal system. Prophets weighing in on how awful people are behaving. Siblings competing for fame and power. Priests divided and supporting competing nobility. And in all this chaos, competition, ego and bloodshed, somehow the covenant between God and the people Israel kicked from side to side, bruised yet managing to survive.<\/span><\/p>\n

Spoiler alert: by the end of this book, the ongoing series of incompetence, betrayal, disloyalty and venality will break the monarchy entirely. Our claim on the land of Israel, our hold on a Holy Temple capable of uniting the people in the service of the one God, the monarchy itself will smash apart on the rocks of our own lack of vision and decency.\u00a0 We will lose it all.<\/span><\/p>\n

Or, almost all. We won\u2019t lose the one God who called us as a people, nor will we lose that covenant. Instead, we will discover that both God and Torah are portable and will go with us wherever we wander in the world. We will discover that there are ways to keep alive our ancient sacred tradition, so that it can provide comfort and resilience, even by the waters of Babylon. And we\u2019ll discover (and forget, and discover, and forget) that the trappings of statehood and power are at best ancillary to our true vitality. The real source of Israel\u2019s vibrant resilience remains our reciprocal love affair with the Holy One, our distinctive fusion of ritual and ethics that emerges as ethical monotheism, and the ongoing expression of that heritage in a people of flesh and blood.<\/span><\/p>\n

All that can be found in this very first chapter: David\u2019s sons battle it out for the throne while the poor man is still alive. His wife and prophet both intervene with him to get him to act, and factions of priests and nobility wrap themselves around the prince they think most likely to succeed. The monarchy\u2019s hold on the people is less than solid. The hold on the sublime morality promised by Torah even less so.<\/span><\/p>\n

And yet \u2026 survive it does. Imperfect though we may be, the people Israel continues to keep that covenant alive, transmits it to the next generation, learns from the mistakes it keeps making, and somehow inspires the next generation not to abandon the effort.<\/span><\/p>\n

That\u2019s it. And that may be as good as it gets in this world. Imperfect people, imperfectly struggling to live up to God\u2019s expectations and our own.<\/span><\/p>\n

Turns out, that may also be as good as it needs to be.<\/span><\/p>\n","image":{"ID":61454,"id":61454,"title":"1kings1-StarofDavidBroken","filename":"1kings1-StarofDavidBroken.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/1kings1-StarofDavidBroken.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-jewish-people-in-one-chapter\/1kings1-starofdavidbroken\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"1kings1-starofdavidbroken","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":61453,"date":"2019-08-19 13:44:14","modified":"2019-08-19 13:44:24","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/jpeg","type":"image","subtype":"jpeg","icon":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":320,"height":310,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/1kings1-StarofDavidBroken-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/1kings1-StarofDavidBroken-300x291.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":291,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/1kings1-StarofDavidBroken.jpg","medium_large-width":320,"medium_large-height":310,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/1kings1-StarofDavidBroken.jpg","large-width":320,"large-height":310,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/1kings1-StarofDavidBroken.jpg","1536x1536-width":320,"1536x1536-height":310,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/1kings1-StarofDavidBroken.jpg","2048x2048-width":320,"2048x2048-height":310,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/1kings1-StarofDavidBroken.jpg","post_full_size-width":320,"post_full_size-height":310,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/1kings1-StarofDavidBroken.jpg","home_baner-width":320,"home_baner-height":310}},"embedded_video":"","video_duration":"","show_fb_comments":true,"credit_media":""},"tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"Everything You Need to Know About the Jewish People \u2013 in One Chapter","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"By the end of the book, because of our incompetence, betrayal, disloyalty and venality, we will lose it all. 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