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I am forwarding the note below from Arthur Waskow because his
quotation from Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel is, to my mind, the
most relevant and prescient statement I have read on these
events. I can only hope and pray that the degree of
responsibilty that Rabbi Heschel called upon his own people to
accept will be the degree of responsibility that all the
proponents on both sides of the current debate will demand.
mp
--
Michael W. Posluns,
The StillWaters Group,
First Nations Relations & Public Policy.
Please note new address: mposluns@accglobal.net
Phone 416 656-8613
Fax 416 656-2715
36 Lauder Avenue,
Toronto, Ontario,
M6H 3E3.
We offer Canadian parliamentary debates by topics and bills.
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From: Awaskow@aol.com
Message-ID: <6492d9c2.243f6462@aol.com>
Date: Fri, 9 Apr 1999 10:10:42 EDT
Subject: Kosovo: economics & ethnics
To: To discuss the Jewish Renewal movement <renew-j@shamash.org>
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Dear Chevra,
I do not think that an economic analysis of the causes of civil war/ ethnic
war in Yugoslavia can be dismissed as simply as R. Michael Lerner seems to
do. It is true (as he says) that economic tensions MIGHT have been dealt with
in other ways, but that does not negate them as crucial factors in shaping
the fear that was then focused into winning ethnic advantage. More on that
as a factor in Yugoslavia in a moment, but first, I want to cite a passage
from Rabbenu Abraham Joshua Heschel, writing on the emergence of Nazism:
"We have failed to offer sacrifices on the altar of peace; now we must offer
sacrifices on the altar of war.... Let Fascism not serve as an alibi for our
conscience.... Where were we when men learned to hate in the days of
starvation? When raving madmen were sowing wrath in the hearts of the
unemployed? . . . In our everyday life we worshipped force, despised
compassion, and obeyed no law but our unappeasable appetite." ("The Meaning
of This War [World War II]," pp. 210-212. Moral Grandeur and Spiritual
Audacity, Susannah Heschel, ed. (Farrar Straus Giroux, 1996)
For me, this brief passage is a model in showing how the economic
("starvation," "unemployment") and spiritual ("despised compassion,"
"unappeasable appetite") can be conjoined in an analysis of history. I do not
find it mushy, but sharp and accurate thinking. And it does not paralyze the
analyst or his readers, but notice that it also does not evade placing
responsibility upon the analyst and his "we" for some major share in the
unfolding disaster.
Considering that Heschel was writing in the midst of the mass murder of his
family, both intimate and ethno-cultural, I find quite remarkable his
willingness to insist on the responsibility of the "uncompasssionate we" for
some share in what happened.
As for Yugoslavia (and other societies): When deep economic disasters strike
a complex society, people often turn to their more intimate communities for
emergency protection and help. Often, one of those structures is an ethnic
complex that offers love, contacts, face-to-face communities like churches
that are already geared toward helping the people in them, etc. In fear, when
people turn ungenerous, these ethnic communities can become places to hoard
and grab whatever economic resources are available. That means drawing lines
AGAINST outsiders.
And it can mean hatred, violence, war, genocide.
It is not so easy to disentangle this process into what is "economic" on the
one hand and what is "cultural," "ethnic," "communal," "spiritual," or
meaning-ful," on the other hand. And I do not think an adequate analysis of
history or of the future, leading to adequate action, can ignore this dynamic
-- not either "side" of it.
The analysis need not prevent us from deciding to act, in one or another way.
But without it, our actions are even more likely to be unwise.
Shalom, Arthur
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