Efrat, Israel - One of the great mysteries of history and sociology is the persistence of the nation of Israel despite persecution, pogrom, and close to 2,000 years of exile. I was even invited to lecture at the other end of the world – before the universities of Beijing and Kaifeng, China – on the mysterious and miraculous survival of Israel, and the universities provided me with the topic! Even Balaam, the Gentile Biblical Prophet of the nations of the world recognized this unique character of Israel – and attempted to define its source.

“How can I curse the nation which is not cursed by G-d, and how can I express anger against the nation not angered at by G-d? It is because I see them from the head of the mountains and I look upon them from the valleys” (Numbers 23:8, 9)

Our classical commentary Rashi interprets Balaam’s incite: “(In order to understand the mystery of Jewish existence) I must look upon Israel’s heads (beginnings, forefathers) and the origin of their roots. I see them established and strengthened like these mountains and valleys by their Patriarch’s and Matriarch’s” (Rashi, ad loc).  And it is precisely because our nation continues to derive its nourishment from the ideals and teachings of its Biblical forebears that Israel has a unique message, quality and power, so that “Behold it is a nation that can dwell alone, without taking account of or being accounted as worthy by the Gentile nations.” (ibid 23:9) In other words, we have an independent, self-starting and self-continuing ideology which enables us to go strong despite world anti-semitism. (Perhaps apocryphal) Incident is recorded that in the first year of the Jewish State President De Gaulle of France came to Israel as the guest of Prime Minister David Ben Gurion. The “lion of Judea” remembering the tree lined Champs Elyses of Paris, hurriedly instructed the police force to chop down trees from the Galilee and to set the trees up along Dizengoff Street where the Prime Minister of Israel would ride together with the President of France in special cavalcade. Unfortunately although the streets were aligned with cheering Israelis the high winds caused tree after tree to fall to the ground, causing not a little cynicism and a good deal of laughter. An amused De Gaulle turned to his host and said, “Apparently your trees are not yet rooted in your soil” responded Ben Gurion, “that may be so but our nation has been rooted in our soil for the past 4,000 years.” And the fact that Ben Gurion regularly hosted a Bible class in the Prime Minister’s office and a Talmud class in his own home only confirmed the truth of his comment….

This significant idea – indeed the very secret of our national eternity – is magnificently expressed in a mishnah in the second chapter of the Ethics of the Fathers. The Mishnah records that Rabban Yohanan ben Zakai sent out his five best disciples to discover the single most important character trait. R. Eliezer said a good eye, R. Yehoshua said a good friend, R. Yose said a good neighbor, R. Elazar said a good heart and R. Shimon said one who sees what will be born. (Hebrew nolad) He then sent the same five out to discover the worst character trait from which individuals must distance themselves. Each gave the opposite of what he had said before (with R. Eliezer saying an evil eye and R. Yehoshua saying an evil friend etc.) and R. Shimon saying, one who borrows and does not pay back.

Clearly, R. Shimon does not seem to be in sync with his colleagues. How come in the second instance he does not say that the worst characteristic is one who does not see what will be born, one who does not recognize in advance the results of his actions?

Allow me to give an alternate explanation of the Hebrew phrase “Ro’eh et hanolad” (as first suggested to me by Rabbi Shalom Gold). Perhaps it does not mean “one who sees what will be born” but rather “one who sees from whom he is born”, one who realizes that he did not emerge from a vacuum but rather from glorious ancestors who gave gifts of universal morality and optimistic faith in the ultimate perfection of society as their legacy for the future. We believe that it is precisely our Jewish adherence to the ideals of our past which has enabled us to continue to live in a way in which we can still envision an even more significant future. And  if G-d forbid we forget our moorings, if we forsake the very roots of our existence and the teachings of our classical texts, then we shall have cut ourselves off from the very soil which nourished us until now and enabled us to live until this point in history. If we become guilty of national Alzheimer’s, we will truly be like those who have borrowed from others and not paid them back; in such a case, we shall have been responsible for the end of Jewish history and the cessation of Jewish eternity.

 It is to be hoped that this is not the case, and that we understand that the Tomb of our Matriarchs and Patriarchs in Hebron, Mother Rachel’s gravesite and the burial place of Joseph are much more than pieces of real estate which can be overlooked and traded away. It is no accident that the Hebrew word for grave is also used in rabbinic literature to mean womb: continued Jewish future will only be possible if it is rooted in Jewish past.