Re: [Cz-L] forgiveness

Purim is a Bible narrative, not History .
Hardy

----- Original Message -----
From: "RUTH GOLD" <glasgold_at_bellsouth.net>
To: <Czernowitz-L_at_cornell.edu>
Sent: Monday, March 18, 2013 3:29 AM
Subject: [Cz-L] forgiveness

> Here we go again... Do we forgive?
>
> Sometime ago, one of our friends received an answer from his Rabbi, which
> I am
> resending. I think it is worthwhile reading and remembering it.
>
> "I have an acquaintance who was born in Germany, but raised most of his
> life in
> the USA. His father was a member of the Nazi youth. I find this very
> difficult
> to ignore. My friend is not like his father. Yet he made a point to tell
> me of
>
> his father's past and his father's hatred of Jews.
>
> Can I truly befriend such a person??"
>
> Answer:
>
> There is a precedent for your question. It goes all the way back to the
> story of
>
>
> Purim.
>
> Haman was the wicked Persian minister who plotted the annihilation of the
> Jewish
>
>
> people. Through a complex sequence of seeming coincidences that were only
> retrospectively recognized as miraculous, his plot was overturned, the
> Jews
> saved, and Haman executed on the very gallows he had prepared for the
> Jewish
> leader Mordechai.
>
> We celebrate the festival of Purim to remember Haman's downfall and the
> victory
> of the Jewish people over their enemies. But there is a little known
> ironic
> addendum to the story. Haman's relationship with the Jewish people
> continued
> posthumously in a most curious way.
>
> The Talmud relates that "Haman's grandchildren studied Torah in BneiBrak."
> That
> means Haman had Jewish offspring. The very man who wanted to destroy the
> Jews
> had rabbis as his descendants.
>
> When the Haman family came to convert to Judaism, their background was
> known,
> and yet they were embraced by the Jewish people as one of us. Indeed a the
> great
> Talmudic rabbi, Shmuel bar Shilas, was a member of that family.
>
> We don't hold children culpable for the wrongs of their fathers. A child
> or
> grandchild of a monster who disassociates from the evils of the past
> should be
> accepted for who they are. Whether Persian or German or Amalekite, the
> gates of
> reconciliation are always open.2
>
> We should never exonerate unrepentant perpetrators of evil. But their
> innocent
> children who actively repudiate their ways, move to a new society and
> adopt
> different values, should not suffer for the moral failures of their
> forebears.
>
> Haman was evil. His grandchildren weren't. They celebrated Purim too. What
> better expression of the triumph of good over evil can there be than that.
>
>
> Good Shabbos and Happy Purim,
>
> Rabbi Moss-Nefesh Synagogue. Sydney, A
>
>
>
>
> Ruth Glasberg Gold

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Received on 2013-03-18 13:14:35