[Avodah] Rav Moshe Feinstein on America

[Micha Berger via Avodah]

R Elli Fischer (CC-ed) posted this translation on Lehrhaus
<http://j.mp/2vJ5Kmz> see there for more background:

   On Wednesday, March 4, 1939, the United States celebrated the 150th
   anniversary of the Constitution becoming the law of the land...
   On the Shabbat after the sesquicentennial, which happened to be
   Shabbat Zakhor, Rabbi Moshe Feinstein...

REF reminds us that this is someone who fled Stalinism speaking at a time
when American Jews were aware of the evils of Nazism, and it was something
of a hayday for both isolationists and Bolsheviks in the US.

Translating from Darash Moshe, Vol. I, pp. 415-6:

   Every superstition and every nonsensical opinion in the world claims
   to bring light to the world and creates beautiful things to deceive
   and win over adherents. However, since many do not espouse them,
   they compel anyone they can, with sword and spear, to adopt their
   views. This is true in all times, with respect to both matters of
   faith and matters of ideology, past and present, and especially in
   Russia and Germany ... Ultimately, all that is left is wickedness,
   not the ideology it was fashioned to support; what need do they have
   for it once they have swords and spears? ... In the end, only the
   sword and spear remain, while the light is completely extinguished,
   as we see in the extremes of Germany and Russia.

   Therefore, no sovereign power should accept one single faith or
   one single ideology, because ultimately only the power will remain,
   without an ideology, and this leads to destruction, as we see with
   our very eyes ...

   This is likewise the case with the attack by Amalek, which had a
   mistaken view they wished to express: that [the redemption of Israel]
   was not miraculous and that there was no reason to fear them. Yet
   they should have first engaged in discussion, to prove their point
   if they could, or to concede the point if they could not. They did
   not do so, instead opting for war straightaway, and thus showing that
   their primary motive was not [to illuminate, but to exercise power]. We
   therefore memorialize them in our hearts and with our mouths, so that
   we know that any religion or system of beliefs that wields power and
   sovereignty and does not rely only on its inherent light is hollow,
   false, and misleading. In truth, there is no light in them. This is
   why we continue to remember Amalek.

   It thus emerges that no national regime may espouse a single system
   of beliefs. Rather, it must only serve its function, which is to
   see that no one perpetrates injustice against another, steals, or
   murders, for if not for the fear of the regime, people would swallow
   one another alive. However, with regard to opinion, religion, and
   speech, everyone shall be free to do as he wishes.

   Therefore, the United States, which established in its Constitution 150
   years ago that it will not uphold any faith or any ideology, rather,
   that each person shall do as he desires, and the regime will see that
   people do not molest one another, is carrying out God's will. It is
   for that reason that they have succeeded and become great in our times.

(Also CC-ed RHM, since he so often quotes RMF's idiom about America
being a "medinah shel chessed.)

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             The mind is a wonderful organ
micha at aishdas.org        for justifying decisions
http://www.aishdas.org   the heart already reached.
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