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Imagine: On Love and Lennon

By Ze’ev Maghen

One man's tirade about universal brotherhood.


I guess like most people, my general ideas about “the way things should be” are to a large extent the product of my childhood. My suburban Philadelphia block was made up of about ten separate houses with ample space between, all of which formed the peripheral ring around this huge, green, common lawn in the middle. The families inhabiting these houses—the Ciartes, the Fitzgeralds, the Popowitches, the Hing-Yips, the Rosenbergs, the Sanchezes—were as incurably and pridefully diverse as the architecture of the houses themselves. Visiting each other, as we often did, was a mind-expanding tour de force: The unexpected smells, the strange conventions, the vastly different notions of decor (for years I begged my parents to paint the inside of our house pink and green like the Ciartes had).
Now, what if someone had taken all these families, and somehow convinced them that it was a waste of space, all these separate houses; a waste of crockery, all these diverse dishes; a waste of artistic effort, all these varying internal and external decors? Everybody should move into one big, humungous house and do all that stuff together, and uniformly. Then everything would be hunky-dory, and far more economical, and look how much closer and more unified everybody would be!
How would you like to live in that house?
We need our separate houses. It’s the only way we can be good neighbors. It’s the only way we can avoid butchering each other with chain-saws and Ginsu knives in a matter of two to three days, tops. And it’s the only way that the interaction between us—nightly on the grassy knoll, or daily in the world of work—can bear any fruit and be any fun. Just as you no doubt live your personal life within a given community as an individual, self-confidently sporting your own singular and special trademark qualities, so nations and ethnic groups need to actively participate in and contribute to the world order and the totality of human civilization as proud, particular, peculiar, unique sociocultural entities, each boasting a brash and defiant attitude of “national individualism,” each, as it were, building, decorating and living in its own distinctive cultural home within the overall neighborhood of nations. Here is Woodrow Wilson’s simple yet crucial insight: The need for “self-determination.” Here is Samuel Coleridge’s “most general definition of beauty—Multeity in Unity.”
“Gotcha!” you say, a self-satisfied smirk spreading speedily across your visage. “All you’ve been pushing for pages now is the direct-ratio relationship between waxing heterogeneity and human progress, between expanding diversity and a life that’s worth living—and now, you’ve thrown the loaded term ‘individualism’ into the pot, to boot. Very well. By your logic, then, we should none of us affiliate with any association or community or nation or even family. Rather, we should focus solely on our own, independent, individual selves—renouncing loyalty to or prejudicial affection for any one particular group—and thereby provide the world with the largest amount of variety and individualism possible! Six billion different and unique colors!”
This is indeed the conclusion which has been reached, consciously or unconsciously, by a great many members of what is often (correctly) referred to as “alienated Western society.” But this approach is not one iota different from the universal “oneness-or-bust” frenzy we’ve been striving to dethrone and debunk so far. If you love everybody you love nobody—and if you love nobody you love nobody. It’s a big circle, and you’ve come full ’round it. You’re talking about eradicating preferential love again—or at least severely restricting its scope and outlets to yourself and perhaps a few intimate relatives and acquaintances (is that all the love you’ve got?). You are talking about opting out of that special community, the hevreh, which the Talmud rightly says it is not worth living without.
And consider, if you will, the humble Persian carpet from my grandfather’s story. Suppose the elders of Kashan had unrolled before the governor not two rugs, but three: The first of elaborate and colorful design, as described; the second, just plain red; and the third, made up of literally tens of thousands of tiny pixels and knots, each dyed its own unique tint, and with no attempt at thematic organization or color coordination whatsoever. What would that rug look like? Dreck, that’s what. Neither full-blown universalism nor full-blown individualism makes for a beautiful world. Only a world which is based on a conception and structure planted firmly between these two poles can ever be called truly beautiful.
For God’s sake, be an individual—and an individualist! I for one certainly lay claim to such a title—with a vengeance. It is because I am an arrogant, uncompromising, incorrigible individualist, and I know like I know my own bedsheets that nobody can ever take my “me-ness” away from me without a sawed-off twelve-gauge shotgun or some such—it is because of this that it never occurred to me to be afraid that I would lose myself in a crowd; it is because of this that I am able and willing to provide myself with the incredible privilege of being an integral participant in that unparalleled, nearly impossible phenomenon… called the Jewish people.
(I guess I should stop here and say this, just for the record: The above generalizations about the position taken respectively by Christianity and Judaism on the issue of love ofand affiliation with—national, cultural, tribal and familial collectives, are just that: generalizations. I have no doubt they could become the target of virulent and often justified assault, at least on some counts. Again, however, I don’t think anyone knowledgeable about these issues would dare to deny that non-Jewish creeds from Bahai to Buddhism, from Islam to Secular Humanism, from Christianity to Communism, are at least far stronger supporters of universal love than Judaism ever was or ever will be. This, I think, everyone will grant. It is true if for no other reason than that none of the other faiths or doctrines mentioned above lays claim in any way to being the cultural-ideological constitution of a particular national or ethnic group. Indeed, such an imputation would be an insult and anathema to the most fundamental principles of every single one of them.
Judaism, on the other hand, makes specifically this claim, and the Jews have traditionally seen the Tora as their own, special, personal possession and guide (there are a few eschatological prognostications emanating from the mouths of the Prophets which might be construed as contradicting this, but even here, the daily Jewish expression of gratitude to “He who separated and distinguished us”—hamavdil or asher bahar—remains at all times the dominant motif). We Jews are and have always been not only adherents to a set of spiritual dogmas, but members of an extended family, of a nation, and of a “tribe” (as the appellative “Jew”—yehudi—most emphaticallty implies). We have never referred to ourselves anywhere in our sources as “dat yisra’el” (the Religion of Israel) or “emunat yisra’el” (the Faith of Israel). Rather, we have always denoted ourselves throughout our long history by the significant cognomens “am yisra’el” (the Nation of Israel), “klal yisra’el” (the Totality of Israel), “knesset yisra’el” (the Assembly of Israel), “beit yisra’el” (the House of Israel) and “bene yisra’el” (the Children of Israel). You see where the emphasis lies, right?
The point is, however, that I promised that I would utilize the purported positions of these various religions and ideologies regarding questions of love and oneness, solely as a paradigm—and that, I hope you understand, is the only thing I am doing. If all the learned rabbis in the entire State of Israel were to assemble in my living room tomorrow and—prior to excoriating and excommunicating one another for various perceived heresies—prove to me chapter and verse that the attitude to love and oneness which I have outlined herein is completely foreign to Judaism, and that it is, say, specifically Christianity which happens to see such issues in that way (i.e., the opposite of the theory I am propounding)—this wouldn’t matter even a smidgen to the argument on behalf of which I am so vehemently expostulating. I would still advocate the particular positions I am currently advocating, regardless of which theology or philosophy is privileged to be used or abused as the paradigm. It is the attitude itself (preferential love, socio-cultural diversity) which I am pushing with all my might—not the religion.)
 
VIII

A few issues, however, may still be troubling you. For instance: Isn’t the world I am asking for perforce a world forever doomed to incessant, desolating warfare between peoples, all of whom love “their own” with a passion and hate everybody else with the same?
For starters, even assuming the One-Worlders could ever bring us peace, which they most definitively cannot, it would only be at the price of a terrorist, totalitarian, socially engineered nightmare that would make George Orwell and Aldous Huxley wet their pants. That is the only possible, earth-bound consummation of the words: “Imagine all the people, living life in peace.” (Stop humming.) If you’ve got no will, no emotions, no preferences and no special ties left to speak of, I guess that’ll take the fight out of you pretty good, all right.


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