BALAK 5784

Gd Has America’s Back

America is in shock over the attempted assassination of Donald Trump last Shabbos. Make no mistake about it, the fault lies with the shooter Thomas Crooks. However, all the anti-Trump vitriol every day, calling him a Hitler, a threat to democracy and our way of life must have some effect. Trump is not an angel. There is plenty of negativity surrounding him. But, realistically, how can you say Trump will destroy democracy as his detractors claim when we’ve seen him as president for 4 years and democracy was not destroyed!

You have to give it to Trump for bravely standing up with blood on his face after he was shot and defiantly shouting, “Fight, fight, fight.” Fight what? For me it was fight the hate, fight the hate, fight the hate! There’s too much hate in our world today and this assassination attempt is but one manifestation of it. I’m not trying to be pro-Trump here. But it was inspiring to me when he later said, “It was Gd alone who prevented the unthinkable from happening.” And that’s what I want to speak about today.

Fight the hate! Jews have always stood up to fight hate. But for Jews personally, it’s fighting antisemitism. As we all know, Antisemitism is in an alarming ascendence today. Why do some people hate Jews? It’s irrational; it doesn’t make sense. Jews have only benefited their communities wherever they found themselves. If the Palestinians truly want to improve the conditions of their lives, they have only to make a real peace and so much good will come their way from Israel and Israelis.

Yes, anti-Semitism makes no sense, but, unfortunately, it does exist. This week’s parsha is named after one of the great anti-Semites—Balak. Who was Balak? The Torah tells us: uValak ben tzipor melech l’Moav ba-eyt hahi, “And Balak the son of Tzipor was king of Moav at that time.” Why doesn’t it just say that he was melech Moav, the “king of Moav?”

The Zohar (III 196b-197a) fills us in on an important detail. It says that Balak was the grandson of Yitro—Moses’ father-in-law. Yitro, you will remember, brought Moses’ family to him to Mt. Sinai after the exodus. Yitro was so taken with the heightened spirituality of the Jewish people that he decided to join them. He converted and returned to his family to convert them as well. They later joined the Jewish people in the desert and they were given the city of Jericho when the Jews came into the Promised Land. The Talmud tells us the descendants of Yitro were great scholars and members of the Sanhedrin—the Jewish Super Supreme Court.

The only one who did not convert to Judaism was his grandson, Balak. Perhaps he was jealous of Moses who lived with them for many years. Perhaps Yitro had given Moses important leadership positions that he coveted. But for whatever reason, Balak hated Moses and his people. And soon he discovered that hating Jews can make one very popular in this world.

Sichon, the king of the Emorites who had conquered the people of Moav attacked the people of Israel and was killed. Israel freed the people of Moav from the cruel king Sichon. They then chose Balak—who wasn’t even a Moabite—to be their leader. Why? because of his great hatred of the Jews. That’s why the Torah says he was “king of Moav at that time.” It’s so ironic. The Jews freed Moav and they in turn look for a leader who hates Jews. It makes no sense. Hate rarely does! 

We don’t really know why some people hate the Jews, but we have seen throughout history that Jew-haters become very popular. Hitler had many enemies, but most of them rallied around him anyway. Why? because of his hatred of Jews. Today, the more than 200 million Arabs can’t agree on anything except hatred for the Jewish nation.

Our Torah portion begins: Vayar Balak, “And Balak saw.” What did he see? Eyt kol asher asa Yisrael la-Emori, “all that Israel had done to the Emorites.” He saw that the Jewish people destroyed them. But he refused to see that the Jews were only defending themselves. It’s much like our world today that accuses Israel of creating poor conditions for the people of Gaza with no mention that Israel was viciously attacked by them, and no mention that Hamas hides in populated areas so when Israel defends itself these conditions result.     

Well, a whole story then plays out with Balak realizing that he can’t defeat the Jews militarily, so he decides to try to defeat them spiritually by hiring the heathen prophet Bilaam to curse them. It’s an elaborate story, the end of which, is that Bilaam’s attempts at cursing the Jews were turned into blessings.

The Chatam Sofer (Yoreh De’ah 356) points out the amazing thing is that the Jews were eyewitnesses to every event in the Torah—except what happened with Bilaam and Balak! The story of Balak and Bilaam with the building of altars and sacrifices and attempted curses that turn into blessings takes place on cliffs that oversee the Jewish camp. But the Jews below those cliffs had no idea that Gd was shielding them from harm, turning the curses into blessings. It’s a great example of how Gd has our backs!

Were you or someone you know ever involved in a terrible accident and somehow, miraculously, just walked away, suffering little or no injury? That’s Gd having your back. Did you ever make a wrong turn, or for no reason take a different path and couldn’t figure out why? That could be Gd protecting you from some misfortune that was awaiting you had you continued on your original pa.

Gd watches over us and protects us in hundreds of different ways every day—in ways we’ll never know. It’s the ultimate demonstration of His love for us, for it’s impossible to thank Him sufficiently because we’ll never know all He does for us.

My friends, Republican or Democrat, I don’t know how you can look at the assassination attempt of Trump and not see the hand of Gd. At the Republican National Convention this week the Republicans said it’s because Gd wants Trump to be president. You can understand why they say that. For me, more important is that with the fragile state of our government now, I’m not so sure how our country would have withstood Trump’s assassination and the chaos that would inevitably follow.

So, last Shabbos we were able to see with our own eyes—hopefully seeing the videos after Shabbos—that Gd had our country’s back! Boy, we sure dodged a bullet. Amen!