A few weeks ago, right after Purim, we had the parsha of Ki Tisa, which I particularly enjoy. This parsha was supposed to be my oldest daughter’s since this is the weekend that we originally scheduled for her Bat Mitzvah. However, deployment came, we changed plans, extension came, we changed plans again, and here we still are. In a sense, life parallels the parsha: while I have the orders, everyone has to pay a price, some price, as a result. And it isn’t fair to say I or any of my family bears the burden heavier, since in the end we all pay the same price of separation, daily difficulties, and interruption of our lives. We get a subtle reminder of that with the prohibition with directly counting the members of the tribe: to start with one point or another might lead to the mistake of thinking that one is more important than another. That is simply not the case, all are equal in merit and all will be noted in time.
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My sister did a wonderful thing for me and sent me a book called Count Your Blessings: One Hundred Prayers For a Day by Rabbi Ron Isaacs. It was a nice, thoughful gift, one that she picked up for me when she took (some of) My Brood to a museam in NYC. Or maybe Philly. I forget which.

I like the book; I really do. Small, compact, it fits in the cargo pocket of my uniform and goes with me wrapped in a Ziplock ™ bag on mission. But there is one thing that struck me right off the bat when I read through it the first time.

There was no commentary. None. Zero. It was just a collection of berachot in a small paperback. Which is not necessarily a Bad Thing, but I don’t think that I have ever seen a Jewish writing on prayer that did not contain commentary of some sort. As “The People Of The Book,” we spend a lot of time commenting, and commenting, and commenting some more on whatever tractate is in front of us.

So I filled in the blanks.

Literally within seconds, I had out a pencil and was scribbling a few notes on the side margins and underneath particular phrases. One berachah in particular was the focus of my attention, part of Refuah, one of the blessings in the Amidah: Baruch atah Adonai, rofei cholei amo Yisrael. Not that there is something particularly wrong with it, I just wanted to expand it some to be more inclusive.

Saying specifically amo Yisrael might lead to the erroneous assumption that this is for The Tribe only; all others need not apply. On my team, there is a theoretical maximum of two Jews, myself and one other who “floats,” that is, fills in when something else pops up that the regularly scheduled crew member can’t make it. (Examples include: being on leave and being in the hospital.) What I wanted to do was have something readily available, something that was both reflective of my specific religious beliefs and something that was inclusive enough to encompass all of the other members of my immediate group.

What I did was to pencil in HaOlam for Yisrael, and make cholay (sick person [translation mine]) plural. Plus, I will usually utter this line of Refuah when I see medevac helicopters flying over, which is a lot more often than I like. I have no way of knowing if the patient is in fact part of amo Yisrael or how many are aboard. This covers the bases all around.

This exercise had the added benefit of me practicing some Hebrew, which was not nearly as rusty as I thought. Maybe it is because of the Siddur and Tanach that My Wife graciously provided me and adorns my shelf here. A little practice helps keep the rust off the mental gears.

The parsha of Zachor was a few weeks ago. I read something on the Aish website about Amalek and his descendants. Haman is the most famous, and that is fitting since the parsha is read around Purim. It is a discussion, though, about the command to stamp out Amalek and his descendants. The article, “A Question of Race?” by Rabbi Ari Kahn, has this though:

We also know that Rabbi Akiva was either himself a convert or a child of converts:

We can hardly appoint Rabbi Akiva because perhaps Rabban Gamaliel will bring a curse on him because he has no ancestral merit. (Brachot 27b. See comments of Rav Nissim Gaon.)

Based on the combination of these sources, there are many that understand that the descendant of Haman who learned and taught Torah in B’nai Brak was, in fact, Rabbi Akiva.

However it is also pointed out in the same article that “It was taught in the name of Rabbi Eliezer: “God swore by His throne of glory, ‘If converts come from any nation they will be accepted, but from the progeny of Amalek and his household they will not be accepted.'” (Mechilta, end of B’shalach. Also see Midrash Tanchuma Ki Tezta 11, P’sikta D’rav Kahana 3)” How can this be?

Obviously, it was ignored. Perhaps there is a good pilpul about how the prohibition for the conversion of Amalekites is laid aside, but I don’t know it.

Perhaps that progeny in this case doesn’t refer to biological progeny, but cultural.

In any event, I think that the important part is not how to reconcile a command to seemingly commit genocide, but a thought that struck me when reading the text itself.

“Remember what Amalek did to you by the way, when you came forth out of Egypt; how he met you by the way, and struck at your rear, all who were feeble behind you, when you were faint and weary; and he did not fear G-d. Therefore it shall be, when the Lord your G-d has given you rest from all your enemies around, in the land which the Lord your God gives you for an inheritance to possess, that you shall blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven; you shall not forget it. (Deut. 25:17-19)”

It struck me that Amalek used a good old-fashioned cavalry romp. This is what I train to do monthly. Get into the rear of the main force and hit the support elements. Strike where you are not expected. Sow fear and confusion. Sharon himself did this crossing the Suez Canal. The result was the complete collapse of two Egyptian divisions that let to a full on rout. Thus ended the western part of the Yom Kippur war. What is so wrong with fighting smarter, not harder? Amalek as a person might be faulted, but his methods of war are fine.

It seems to make no sense. We are commanded to blot out the remembrance of Amalek, but also not to forget it. What gives?

The remembering that is blotted out in a time of peace and comfort is not the name of the commander. The remembrance that needs to be put aside is the fear that was caused. There is a time for everything, a time for war, and a time for peace. The situation once in the land that the Lord gives is one of calm, peace, and tranquility. We need to remember that. We need to live in the now, view the situation as it is today, not be haunted by the ghosts of the past. The problem with post-traumatic stress isn’t the stress, it is the post, the after the fact. Being stressed in a time of trauma is fine. Being stressed long after the trauma is not.

This passage certainly has use today with the disengagement in Gaza. I’ll sidestep the debate on right or wrong. Something that does bother me, though, is that we as Jews are still being held emotionally hostage by the failure of Oslo. There has been a lot of anger and dissillusionment. Certainly modern-day Amaleks besieged us. We were harassed, hassled, and had fear put in us. That fear needs to be put down, the remembrance of the trauma put in its proper place. There is a time for everything and the time we are in is now, not then. This is Disengagement, not Oslo.