Wrestling With an Angel: Power, Morality, and Jewish Identity

363 Pages·2003·1.17 MB·English

by  Ehud Luz

Wrestling with an Angel

E H U D L U Z
Wrestling with an Angel
POWER, MORALITY, AND
JEWISH IDENTITY
Translated from the Hebrew by
Michael Swirsky
Yale University Press
New Haven &
London
Published with the assistance of
The Wolfson Chair in Jewish Thought, University of Haifa
The Amos Fund for the Encouragement of Scholars and Writers
Oranim Teacher’s College, Kiryat Tiv’on
Research Authority of the University of Haifa
and with assistance from the Louis Stern Memorial Fund.
All rights reserved by
The Magnes Press
of the Hebrew University
Jerusalem
1998
ISBN 965–493–010–2
Copyright ∫ 2003 by Yale University.
All rights reserved.
This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, including illustrations, in
any form (beyond that copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S.
Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public press), without written
permission from the publishers.
Set in Sabon type by Keystone Typesetting, Inc.
Printed in the United States of America by Sheridan Books, Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Luz, Ehud.
[Ma’avaòk be-naòhal Yaboòk. English]
Wrestling with an angel : power, morality, and Jewish identity / Ehud Luz ;
translated from the Hebrew by Michael Swirsky.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.
ISBN 0-300-09293-8 (n/a : alk. paper)
1. Jews—Identity. 2. Zionism and Judaism. 3. Ethics, Jewish. 4. Power (Social
sciences)—Moral and ethical aspects. 5. Sovereignty—Moral and ethical aspects.
I. Title.
DS143.L8913 2003
296.3%6—dc21
2003001708
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the
Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on
Library Resources.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
That night he arose and . . . crossed the ford of the Jabbok. . . .
Jacob was left alone. And a man wrestled with him until the
break of dawn.
When he saw that he had not prevailed against him, he
wrenched Jacob’s hip at its socket,
So that the socket of his hip was strained as he wrestled with
him.
Then he said, ‘‘Let me go, for dawn is breaking.’’
But he answered, ‘‘I will not let you go, unless you bless me.’’
Said the other, ‘‘What is your name?’’ He replied, ‘‘Jacob.’’
Said he, ‘‘Your name shall no longer be Jacob, but Israel,
For you have striven with beings divine and human and have
prevailed.’’
Genesis 32:23–30
‘‘And a man wrestled with him’’—
Rabbi Hama son of Rabbi Hanina said:
It was Esau’s guardian angel.
Genesis Rabbah 77

Contents
Preface ix
Introduction: Identity and National Ethos 1
Part One: The Will to Power
1 Power, Freedom, and Political Independence in Jewish Thought 19
2 Shame, Guilt, and Suffering in Jewish Culture
until Modern Times 29
3 The Shame of Exile and the Zionist Recovery of Jewish Dignity 42
4 ‘‘The Remnant of Israel’’ 66
5 The Wager in Greenberg’s The Ways of the River 91
6 Messianism and Realism 103
Part Two: The Moral Price of Sovereignty
7 Criticism of the Idea of Sovereignty in Non-Zionist Thought 115
8 Sovereignty and Jewish Commitment after the Holocaust in
the Thought of Emil Fackenheim, George Steiner,
and Irving Greenberg 142
viii Contents
Part Three: Power and Jewish Identity in Israeli Public Discourse
9 Sovereignty and Power in Zionist Debate during
the Mandate Period 165
10 Reacting to Arab Terror 198
11 Halakha and Morality in Religious Zionism after
the Six-Day War 221
12 Persecuted or Persecutor? 238
13 Challenging the Zionist Ethos 247
Conclusion: Politics in Israel as a Test of Judaism 274
Notes 283
References 315
Index 339
Preface
After the Bar Kokhba revolt (132–135 ce) and the eradication of all
trace of Jewish political independence in Palestine, Jews gave little thought to
questions of war. Long exile freed them from the sharp moral dilemmas con-
fronted by any polity that is compelled to use force to defend itself. Jews
considered warfare to be the ‘‘craft of Esau,’’ that is, a matter for the gentiles,
at least until such time as the Messiah would come. The Jews—‘‘Jacob’’—
took no interest in armed conflict except insofar as it might impinge upon their
fate as a minority living under foreign rule. To be sure, Jewish literature con-
tains more than a few ruminations about war and the morality of war, but
with the exception of Maimonides’ Laws of Kings, they do not coalesce into
any systematic teaching, such as the doctrine of the ‘‘just war’’ that developed
in the Christian world out of direct experience. (Ironically enough, this doc-
trine relied to a considerable degree on ancient Jewish sources dealing with
warfare, especially the book of Deuteronomy, and then had an influence on
the Jews, in turn, when they returned to Palestine.)
Zionism, the resettlement of Palestine, and political independence thus
posed moral dilemmas for the Jews that for many generations they had not
had to confront. They then devised new norms for the use of force, such as that
of ‘‘purity of arms,’’ but they did not begin with a clean slate. Zionist thought
and literature were influenced, consciously or not, by the body of earlier Jew-