I could not believe what I read this week. Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel suggested in a private speech to Jewish Democrats on Aug. 30 that they should sacrifice their own safety and comfort in exchange for what she described as “the opportunity to save the rest of humanity.”

Nessel referenced the story of Queen Esther, who offered to sacrifice her own life to save the Jewish people. “It is perhaps up to us now to follow in her path,” she declared, “and sacrifice the comfort, safety and security and even the very future of our own people in exchange for the opportunity to save the rest of humanity… What good is defending the historic homeland of our ancestors and demanding that candidates acknowledge its right to exist if the planet upon which it rests is no longer inhabitable?”[1]

I first read about this Michigan mishuga’as in the Wall Street Journal, which did not provide any background information about the speaker. I was shocked that a minor, non-Jewish elected official would make remarks about compromising Jewish security and even forfeiting Israel’s existence that even better-known and long-infamous antisemitic politicians might be hesitant, at least on a good day, to make. The Jews have enough internal conflict about their national politics. We need the friendly, unsolicited advice of hostile outsiders informing us of our moral duty to commit national suicide like a luch in kup, a hole in our head. (Although I was relieved when I soon discovered, no thanks to the WSJ editorial page, that this woman is the first Jewish attorney general in her state, I remained appalled and aghast that a Jew could be so careless and reckless about her own people’s safety and existence.[2]) A passage in Parshas Nitzavim features a fascinating counterexample of a time when we seem unable to understand our fate without outside input.

Ignoring the warnings of the Torah, Am Yisrael strays into idolatry, and the Almighty brings Churban, exile following a severe destruction of Eretz Yisrael. Generations later, their descendants, born in exile, and those in other far-away nations appear to lapse into a state of speechlessness, like the son who doesn’t know how to ask. After seeing the lasting consequences of the destruction and utter wasteland still left in its wake, they can only declare with shock that this once plentiful land is comparable only to the desolate, uninhabitable, and infertile lands of S’dom and Amora. They lack the words to express their confusion about what could have caused such a drastic disaster. The response doesn’t come from Moshe Rabeinu, another prophet, the Chachmei Hamesorah, the Rabbinic Sages, or even from a letter to the editor in Mishpacha Magazine, but from Kol Hagoyim, all the nations.[3] “Why did G-d do that to this land, and what got Him so furious?” the Goyim ask, rhetorically, and then explain, “Because they forsook the covenant of Hashem, the G-d of their ancestors, and worshiped idols.” Stepping back, this is a remarkable saga: The Torah warns against worshiping pagan gods, specifies the consequences, then predicts that, in the future, the warning will be tested and the consequences will, unsurprisingly, follow. When they do, it further predicts that, despite the unambiguous warning, many onlookers will be unable to connect the dots backward and recognize that the desolation they now see is due to Am Yisrael triggering the algorithm, which brought about this inevitable result. Who will help them comprehend the math? The Goyim.

It is seldom easy to hear outside input, certainly when it’s critical. A person once aggressively yelled at and berated the great Mussar leader R. Simcha Zissel Ziv (1824 – 1898, known as the Alter of Kelm). His talmidim, recognizing that the accoster was not well, quickly intervened to prevent their rebbe any further disrespect. “Leave him be,” R. Simcha Zissel demanded, “someone is finally speaking the truth and revealing my flaws!”[4] Sometimes the Goyim do not address us directly but teach us through their actions. In Sefer Yonah, the inhabitants of Ninveh do teshuva, and Yonah is concerned about how it will reflect on Am Yisrael if they cannot manage to repent, but the non-Jews do.  

Accepting the truth from any source is reminiscent of Rambam’s justification for how he acquired his thorough knowledge of astronomy. He records that the tribe of Yisachar authored books on the topic based on their prophetic insight, but, by Rambam’s time, they were no longer extant. Without those texts, how was he able to compose the nineteen detailed and complex chapters of Hilchos Kiddush Hachodesh, the Laws of Sanctification of the New Moon, and the fundamentals of the Jewish calendar? The Greeks also wrote about astronomy, he explains, and those texts did survive, and that is what he had available. Unusual as it may seem to base Torah laws on Greek writings, when they are backed up by clear, irrefutable evidence, the author becomes irrelevant, and non-Jewish experts are not less reliable than prophets.[5]
As we approach our annual series of Selichos, the Yamim Noraim, and the Aseres Yemei Teshuva, we want to make improvements and are eager to hear advice; sometimes, as in our parsha, the outsiders may be the only ones who can identify the signal from the noise. As Michigan Jewish Democrats discovered this week, we cannot assume that anyone dishing out ideas and suggestions is not a meshugener. Nevertheless, if, as Rambam says, someone’s criticism or diagnosis of our spiritual malady stands up to scrutiny, we cannot ignore it, no matter who shares it.