As I studied this week’s Torah portion (Shemos), it occurred to me that the Egyptian enslavement of the Jewish people was our nation’s first brush with anti-semitism. Unfortunately, our experience with anti-semitism has not stopped in Egypt; rather it has continued throughout our history. No matter where the Jewish people have lived, at some point in time anti-semitism managed to rear its ugly face. Regardless of how hospitable our host country may have been, somehow they too evolved into a source of terror and pain. The modern day Jew is no exception; anti-semitism is still alive and well and something we all endure. Although we may have no control over the prevalence of anti-semitism, we do have the ability to decide how we as Jews will respond.
Naturally, many of us may feel that the only method of combating anti-semitism is to fight back. If someone punches us in the face we must respond in kind. We cannot allow ourselves to be treated like doormats and be stepped all over.
The problem with the “eye for an eye” approach is, at best it is a short-term solution. Even if we are successful in winning the battle, we are not going to win the war. There are too many people who are motivated to put an end to Judaism.
There is another philosophy, which believes that the only way to extinguish the flames of anti-semitism is for the Jewish people to conform to their surroundings and try our best to fit in. They believe the source of tension between the Jews and the rest of the world is our insistence on being different.
Unfortunately, history has shown that the ‘blending in” belief is flawed. The assimilated Jew has never been immune to anti-semitism. Anti-semites do not care about how well you fit in to society; a dirty Jew is a dirty Jew.
The most potent way to fight anti-semitism is to resolve to re-commit ourselves with even more intensity to our Jewish heritage. Every time a Jew performs a commandment of the Torah filled with pride it is a slap in the face of anti-semitism. When we instill in our children the honor and beauty of Judaism, it is a step in defeating those who want to crack the very foundation of Judaism. The goal of anti-semitism is to harass and break the will of the Jew. Our job is to respond and demonstrate to the world and ourselves that nothing can deter us from our mission to be closer to our Creator and to sanctify His name.
