THE MIDDLE PATH

Lovey dovey jews, that's who we are, the two character traits synonymous with the jewboy are kindness and mercy, it runs through our veins it beats in our hearts, the love of our fellow is a natural, genetic inherant part of us.

Miamonidies writes, that the path on which all men should travel is the middle path, the abraxas bridge, no extreme is good, we must strive to find a balanced equilibrium in all matters in which we conduct ourselves, anyone who finds himself leaning unhealthily in one direction should search for a balancing medium.

For us as jews who time and time again have handed an olive branch to our enemies only to have it thrown back into our faces, and as we wonder in shock what we've done wrong this time, maybe we need to find our middle path.

The torah is a book of rules, a book of guidelines, restrictions and yes, severity, the perfect antidote to create the balancing act between being merciful and being too merciful, if the baby cries when you take away a knife he's been playing with no one will tell you that the nice thing to do is to return the knife.

The torah is clear about how to handle a situation as we see unfolding before our eyes daily in the holy land, if one approaches to kill you, one is obligated to take the first shot to eliminate the threat, even if the threat is only in potential and even on the holy day of shabbos.

Without the guidelines of the torah, the jewish people is faced with it's worst enemy, the confused jew, the 300 british jews who paid 10,000 pounds to take our a full page add in the london times condemning the acts of their brothers on the front lines, defending the jewish state, the 10% of Israeli jews that still cry over israeli aggression that provokes the murderous actions that they live with daily.

As teenagers in israel face the heroic task of physically defending the land, it is our responsibility in the diaspora to fight this war on a different front, by using our inborn attributes to share the light and fulfillment that comes with torah knowledge and observance, with all jews that may not have had the opportunity of torah exposure.

Let us bring judaism to the jew, let us take tefillin to jewish offices and mezuzos to jewish homes, let us share the illumination of the shabbos candles with all jewish women, and let jewish education be available to all jewish children, let there be a tzedakah box in every jewish establishment, and may acts of goodness and kindness be the stuff of our daily lives.

Together, with this spirit of unity, we can stand strong as a jewish nation with one heart and one soul, and when the people of the book follow the guidelines of the book, the nations of the world will see that jewish blood is not cheap.