Prof. Paul Eidelberg
Various readers wonder why I often mention the theme of honor, especially
in connection with the government of Israel. Let me explain.
Israel is reputed to be a democracy. Democracy, today, is a mixed blessing,
for its two cardinal principles, freedom and equality, provide no norms for
human conduct. Both freedom and equality have become indiscriminate (as witness
various decisions of Israel’s Supreme Court). While freedom has produced
a multiplicity of “lifestyles,” all lifestyles have become morally
equal or respectable. One can hardly say that any lifestyle is shameful. But
if nothing is shameful, nothing is honorable.
The only way to avoid the moral chaos prevalent in contemporary democracy
is to derive freedom and equality from the biblical conception of man’s
creation in the image of G-d. By so doing, these two basic principles of democracy
will be graced by ethical constraints, such as those of the Ten Commandments.
This was the case of classical democracy, which flourished in eighteenth-century
America. The colleges and universities of that time were founded by ministers
quite learned in Hebraic civilization. They saw in the basic institutions of
the Torah a model for a Constitutional Democracy which limits the powers of
government on the one hand, while providing a theological foundation for the
rights of the individual on the other. That foundation—again, man’s
creation in the image of G-d—is the only sound source of human dignity,
hence of honor.
Consider how honor was defined in the eighteenth-century lexicon: “Honor
[is] distinct from mere probity, and … supposes in a gentleman
a stronger abhorrence of perfidy, falsehood, or cowardice, and a more elevated
sense of virtue, than are usually found in [ordinary decent men].” I have
emphasized the word “gentleman” because “government by gentlemen”
was the ideal of Jeffersonian democracy.
Jefferson conceived of democracy as a government ruled by what he termed a “natural
aristoi” consisting of men of “virtue and talent.” Such
men, he believed, would be recognized and elected to public office by an educated
citizenry. The perennial problem of reconciling wisdom and consent would thus
be achieved.
Needless to say, contemporary democracy is very far from the Jeffersonian ideal.
Something must be wrong with the education of its citizens. They seldom elect
to public office men of virtue and talent. In fact, they despise most politicians,
without realizing that their contempt is a reflection on themselves and on contemporary
education.
Education in contemporary democracy is morally neutral. This is why all lifestyles
are morally equal. Just as the eighteenth-century principle of political
freedom has metamorphosed into personal freedom, so the eighteenth-century
principle of political equality has metamorphosed into personal
equality, and there it has become total or totalitarian.
Who is to say what is “art” and what is “pornography”?
Who is to say what is “decent” or “indecent, “good”
or “bad,” “noble’ or “base”? This relativism,
propagated by “higher” education, more or less infects every branch
of democratic government, especially Israel’s Supreme Court.
And so the first casualty of democracy is HONOR. In an age devoid of honor,
a murderous villain like Yasser Arafat can win a Noble Peace Prize.
That monstrous travesty, however, was made possible by two Jews, Yitzhak Rabin
and Shimon Peres. The stain on Israel as well as the cost in human life is immeasurable.
This is why I write often on the theme of honor and caution the present government
of Israel not to collaborate with Arafat (or his proxies) whose hands are stained
with Jewish blood.
Let me remind members of this government of an event that took place in 1929.
In that year the Arabs, with British connivance, indulged in an orgy of rape
and murder that destroyed the ancient community in Hebron. The British mandatory
government invited prominent Jews to Government House, presumably to express
condolences for the pogrom which included the most savage mutilation of men,
women, and children. When the British Secretary of the Mandatory Government
extended his hand to greet Chief Rabbi Avraham Yitzhak Kook, the religious leader
of the Yishuv, that great Rabbi refused the handshake saying it was a hand “besmirched
with Jewish blood.”
Israel’s present Prime Minister, who proudly declared he is a Jew first
and an Israeli second, would do well to ponder and imitate the exemplary conduct
of Rabbi Kook. Rabbi Kook was in all respects a Jew first. Hence he was a man
of honor, a man who abhorred perfidy, falsehood, and cowardice.