May 19, 2002

2:21 PM

A fascinating analysis of the typological thinking that defined the historical outlook of the Jews for many centuries, and an explanation of why the Jewish people has the image of itself as that of a people forever on the verge of ceasing to be. But the bad is not always the worst. To prepare oneself for the bad without preparing oneself for the worst: This is the spiritual challenge of a liberal order. http://www.thenewrepublic.com/doc.mhtml?i=20020527&s=wieseltier052702
posted by semmi (3 comments total)

That is a really great article. I read it all, and I completely agree with it. I'm going to email it to a bunch of people. Good post.
posted by bingo at 5:52 PM on May 19, 2002

Interesting post, Semmi. Wieseltier says that the Jews are overreacting to everything going on Jewish these days.

I argue that he's the one with an atrophied sense of Jewish history. Althougth I agree with you that the challenge of contemporary Judaism is to find strength in this challenge (and the commandment of Shavous is to "be happy" during these days), it is unmistakable that Jews are consistently at the top of the list of every maniacal ideology. Today is not very different, sadly. Also, I don't really see how Wieseltier (in this sense an apologist of sorts) argues for a spiritual challenge.
posted by boardman at 10:49 AM on May 20, 2002

...it is unmistakable that Jews are consistently at the top of the list of every maniacal ideology. Today is not very different, sadly.

The whole point of the article is that it's different because Jews have more power now on an international scale than we have had since the reign of King David.
posted by bingo at 8:43 PM on May 20, 2002