Editorial: How we fight

The anti-Semite says, “I hate the Jewish people, but Schwartz and Mandelbaum I like.” And the Jew says, “I love the Jewish people, but Schwartz and Mandelbaum I can’t stand.”

And so it goes. We could conclude now and stop the presses on all the papers, magazines and books dealing with community tolerance and diversity. Just halt the discussions and arguments. That’s the whole story. We fight tooth and nail against our enemies while deriding our very own charedim and secularists … and everything different to us in between.

Firstly, we should combat with all our might and fervor those nations who seek to destroy us. Secondly, we, of course, can disagree with those in our Jewish family and extended Jewish community. But it’s not what you do; it’s how you do it.

In fact, you can tell everything about a person or a people by the way they argue and fight with each other. One cannot judge a relationship of a couple while they are having a romantic dinner. It tells us nothing about their true connection. But if you have the opportunity to see how they argue, then you will know everything you need to know about them. Are they civil even within the argument? Are they leaving room for each other to reconcile? Are they arguing as a couple that is ultimately in love with each other? Character is defined by the way one argues, not by the way one kisses. We display our very best of who we really are… during our disputes.

A novice student of Talmud and a learned scholar of its commentary are both well aware that they are studying a textual argument between rabbis. And more incredibly, they are witnessing rabbis who are arguing centuries apart from each other. Each generation’s sacred endeavor is to read about these opposing views which are making their case and rarely reaching reconciliation. It’s certainly an arduous task and sometimes quite difficult to follow their brilliant intricate logic, but we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that they are quarreling with sanctity. There is holiness to their disagreements and commentary.