Yeah, Culture Does Matter |
One cannot get around the reality that not all people are right for a successful West.
There was a big announcement in Jerusalem that archaeologists had found a 2,000-year-old “mikvah” (ritualarium) under the Temple Mount. These baths have been used for thousands of years by Jews to remove “ritual impurity”. Finding another mikvah near the site of the two Temples is not a great surprise, though it is always moving to see such ancient stone structures. Priests or Kohanim (the basis for the name Cohen), as well as regular Jews, had to immerse themselves prior to entering the Temple. Many were quick to point out that the mikvah is one more proof that Jews lived here long ago, long before there was Islam or Palestinians. That’s true, but in my mind, such facts are secondary. I once lived in a house in Wilmette, Illinois. That does not give me the right to go there and take it over. The modern state of Israel is the product of lands purchased over generations and defensive wars won by Israeli forces. That there were Jews here long ago is an important fact, but the modern state of Israel exists, like many other states, as a product of victories in war and not solely via historical claims.
The key moment of a Jewish conversion occurs during the final step: immersion in a modern mikvah, nearly identical to the one recently discovered in Jerusalem. What is in the mind of the one converting to Judaism at the time of immersion—whether he/she accepts upon himself/herself the Torah commandments—is something that only the convert and God can know. Intent is key, and we cannot know a person’s........