Are you ready to unpack the intricate challenges surrounding the Israel crisis and discover tangible ways to lend your support? Rabbi Ken Spiro joins us in this enlightening conversation where we traverse the fields of geopolitics, religion, and personal growth. We delve into the pressing need for financial assistance to impacted communities and explore the idea of embarking on a journey to Israel in the post-crisis period. We also take a bold stance against misinformation and urge you to join us in advocating for truth and communication with political leaders.
This episode also brings to light the eternal struggle between truth and falsehood, as we emphasize the significance of aligning with reality and absolute morality. We unravel the ties between global events and our relationship with God, and address the repercussions of internal discord among Jews. Rabbi Spiro and I also underscore the importance of spiritual action, providing insights on how you can strengthen your connection with Judaism. Join us for a profound discussion on unity, truth, and our responsibility towards Israel in these trying times.
Are you ready to unpack the intricate challenges surrounding the Israel crisis and discover tangible ways to lend your support? Rabbi Ken Spiro joins us in this enlightening conversation where we traverse the fields of geopolitics, religion, and personal growth. We delve into the pressing need for financial assistance to impacted communities and explore the idea of embarking on a journey to Israel in the post-crisis period. We also take a bold stance against misinformation and urge you to join us in advocating for truth and communication with political leaders.
This episode also brings to light the eternal struggle between truth and falsehood, as we emphasize the significance of aligning with reality and absolute morality. We unravel the ties between global events and our relationship with God, and address the repercussions of internal discord among Jews. Rabbi Spiro and I also underscore the importance of spiritual action, providing insights on how you can strengthen your connection with Judaism. Join us for a profound discussion on unity, truth, and our responsibility towards Israel in these trying times.
This is the Living in Clarity podcast. I'm Coach Ratner. This is Rabbi Ken Spiro. Ken, people are asking all the time what can they do with the going on here in?
Ken Spiro:Israel Right. So that's a great question. I am getting literally on WhatsApp especially. Yeah, hundreds of people are messaging me. We're praying for you. What can we do? And I think then there's really two levels of looking at Does the practical, physical live in the physical world level of what we can do? And then there's the more spiritual, and both have to be addressed. It's like you got like the disease on the inside and the sores on the skin from the disease. You've got to put the cream on the sores which you've got to deal with the disease. You've got to eat that, whatever it's doing internally.
Ken Spiro:So on a basic practical level people I'm telling people there's so much need for support in the country. There's the communities destroyed in the area around Gaza, soldiers missing equipment, that kind of stuff. If any resources a person can give, they should be contributing to. Okay, all of us giving just a little bit. We've learned that from crowdfunding, you know, can make a big difference. And now the need is huge and the cost to Israel is going to be amazing. By the way, when it's over, I'm always telling everyone come to Israel and visit.
Coach Ratner:Well, that's how I try to actually plan a trip to Israel. That's what you can do. I'm a tour guide.
Ken Spiro:I lost all my business, all my income gone, you know. But I'm thinking people are saying a guy wrote me I'm canceling my trip, I'm not going to come. For years I said I said you're basically a coward. The first thing you should do when it's quiet is give them a planning. Come here, show support, spend your money here, come be part of the Jewish people. You know this is your country, this is your homeland. Also, I'm telling people you gotta be. You know you gotta be politically active. If you see, if these rallies go to them, stand up to evil. The other side is always better organized. These rallies, literally the day after they're screaming about how Israel is like a Zionist occupying Nazi murderers. You gotta confront it with the truth.
Coach Ratner:I think the issue is from someone like me who grew up in a posh, you know luxury, you know nice, safe place in Maryland, virginia, that we don't have that hate. See, they have this massive hate from the Jewish people and so they go out there and they blame us for everything, whatever it is, it's always our fault, right. And for us, we don't hate them Like we don't have this. Like when we kill a terrorist, we don't celebrate. When they, when they kill Jews in 9-11 happened, they go and celebrate. So for us, we don't have that passion of a hate like we hate, do we? Or we just want to? We love Israel, we love the Jewish people. For how do we septiculate that support? Besides, obviously not everyone wants to go to, to stand at these rallies where their violence could break out. Obviously, if you saw what the Hamas did to the Jewish people in Israel, what can happen on a rally in Chicago or New York or Miami or LA? It can happen anywhere.
Ken Spiro:Well, first of all, the good news is it's just not in the Jewish personality, and there is such thing as a Jewish personality. It's like a spiritual genetic. The rabbis talk about it all the time. The Jews are right, manim by shanim gom lech hasidim, that we are merciful and modest and we do goodness. And you can prove this by the way. Historically, you can show this. It's not the Jewish way to be vengeful and violent, not that there aren't some Jews who do it, but that's a good thing.
Ken Spiro:We have to be aware that. First of all, what you're saying is true. There's a deeper message here about what this whole thing means for us in general, the Jewish people, whether you live in Israel or not in Israel. But it's really important we don't get intimidated. Okay, we're not going to fight back and act like them. They're calling for us to go to the gas chambers. We're not going to say that back to them at all. But it's also important we hold them, scare us, because Edmund Burke, who defended the American Revolution in the British Parliament he was an Irish parliamentarian in the British Parliament he said all it takes to be able to try office for good men to do nothing, and the worst thing we can do is go high.
Ken Spiro:We got to stand up and confront this. So, on a more practical level, in addition to using whatever resources we have, be they financial, political connections we got to be proactive Show up at rallies, show your support, write to newspapers, counteract lies. There's so many websites, so much information going around. Of course, what happens is it's kind of like a reverberation we're sharing the same information between the same people. All believe the same thing anyway. Well, we need to be focusing on those people who are not the radical jihadists.
Coach Ratner:Definitely not the red-green alliance.
Ken Spiro:the extreme left that hates us and black-like matters and stuff like that. We need to be focusing on those people who are in the middle, who are getting bombarded from both sides, but writing to politicians, the support is going to dwindle. I've been telling people since the day this started yeah, right now there's a book called People Love Dead Jews. They have a great book. We always get a little sympathy. There's some sort of algorithm depending on how many Jews are killed and wounded and how many horrible images there are. We're going to get a certain number of days, a wriggle room, to do what we like and then it turns. The mainstream media and, before you know it, disproportionate response, show restraint and we can't defend ourselves anymore.
Coach Ratner:You just got to die. I know it's amazing that you go on CNN. It's like a football game. Oh, these many people died. These many people died. Israel is making people die. These people were in the Palestinian people. This is not a game. It's not how many people died. That makes me nuts how they do that. And then people say, oh, they're not acting proportionately. What should Israel do proportionately? Oh, they should go in and rape women, bring them alive, flip babies to the streets, kill families, entire families, up to fortunate people. Oh, is that equal? Is that what the situation will do? How do you answer that question?
Ken Spiro:Well, the answer is the real problem is the lack of clarity about truth in the world. That is the real struggle, in my opinion. It's about and the world is dividing basically, whatever side of the conflict you're on, it's basically showing how much in reality you live. This is the most unambiguous conflict since World War II. After Pearl Harbor, people were not marching to the streets of New York with Japanese flags.
Ken Spiro:And they put the force. The personal response what happened since then is the world has lost its moral compass. That's a much deeper conversation, by the way, and how I know it's true or not. It's not so hard to figure out what's true or not. If a person is dedicated to living in reality and wants to know the truth, you can wade through the propaganda floating around and come to a pretty clear historical and ideological understanding of what good is and what evil is, and Israel behaves with war history.
Ken Spiro:This is the only people are going to begin to appreciate what it's like to live in this country, which is this little normal right, it's a Millivial War. You look at my window. People are outside, I mean, a lot of empty streets and stuff but we're surrounded by a bunch of countries that are openly calling for our destruction, which is a violation of the. They should be thrown out of the UN, by the way. I'd like to do that. America, you know the Canadians are going to attack all eight of them in army. Now, seriously, we don't realize what we're living amongst. The threats.
Ken Spiro:All of Israel's wars are within our country, on our borders, and existentially for our survival. If people are talking about them like, yeah, it's just living in La Landa. Living in La Landa and a person has to make a decision? Wherever they are, be they Jewish or non-Jewish, am I going to get the clarity and be into truth, regardless of how uncomfortable it might make me feel, and recognize that the Jewish people have a right to defend themselves and to do whatever it takes to make sure that we can survive Because that's what we're literally doing here and to keep score like imagine World War II. This many, not that many.
Ken Spiro:Soviet soldiers. Who ever heard of a?
Coach Ratner:fighting war. I want to get back to the top we're talking about. What can I do? So we said, on a physical level, play in that trip to Israel. That's one thing. Another thing they can do is to give to charities that are helping soldiers. Charities are helping the people on the ground. What are some of those charities? Do you know any of them? Well, there's things like FIDF.
Ken Spiro:Friends of the French. There's, you know there's. Thank Israel, these soldiers, yeah, there's yeah, there's United Hutsala, the Zaka, which is your organization, which has to identify the bodies. There's still hundreds of bodies that are unidentified.
Coach Ratner:My neighbor where I live in Jerusalem. He is best friend, head of Zaka. He was telling me stories that I can't even. I can't even listen to him, I can't even repeat them. They're so disgusting and and and it's almost it's. This is not humane, this is not, this is not even within the realm of reality you could imagine is going to happen. Which means is it going to happen here?
Ken Spiro:It can happen anywhere. Yeah, these are all crimes against humanity. Yeah, we're equivocating on them. Maybe Israel's doing it. What Hamas does, whether it's to Israelis or its own population, is war crimes and crimes against humanity. But there's a lot of you know. There's this mug and a double at a dome. Yeah, oh yeah, there's the Hutsala.
Coach Ratner:There's so many different organizations. Let me let me explain. You know, I have saw because I'm reading the book called 90 Seconds, which is about LED or LED or stars organization, because he noticed that and this is true in a lot of cities that when someone calls for ambulance it takes five, 10, 20 minutes to get there, and many times someone's having a heart attack, someone's choking and it's too late. But there's so many people that are within a block or the same building that have actually saved someone's lives, so that's how they started selling it. These are people who live in the community, who have beepers and who are EMTs or doctors and they can save people's lives. It might not be the top doctors there, but they can save someone's life in a minute. And the book's called 90 Seconds because his goal is to have someone on the scene in 90 seconds and it's now become a reality in many countries, many cities around the world.
Coach Ratner:Your, scott. My name is Scott. I've both moved to out of Chicago. I don't know if the lake has it. The lake has it. I'm sure they do. It's all out. It is here in Jerusalem. And then a great organization as they save people's lives.
Ken Spiro:Right. So there's plenty of stuff like that. And also, what's really, really important is to keep the political pressure up because, like a country like America's support for Israel is critical on a strategic level and you can see people are all you know the political right in America tends to be more ambiguous about the support for Israel. There's a lot of people vacillating in the center of the Democratic Party. Yes, dividing it 100%, not me baking this up. You can see on the percentages of people who support and don't support.
Ken Spiro:You got to write your congressman, write the White House. It's so critical and America plays such a key role in the world their ability to block security council resolutions. And America is the one great superpower that spends more on its defense budget in the next 10 countries in the world combined. So this is critical. You know God runs the world, but we got to act in the physical world and do whatever we can do. And people shouldn't rest. We should never become complacent. We should always be graysily out there, proud of how Israel is behaving, connected to the Jewish people, as proactive as possible in every way we can be Okay.
Coach Ratner:That's on a physical level. What can we do if we're not living in Israel? And what we do want to spear on a deeper level, what can we do spiritually?
Ken Spiro:Right. So there you know. I always talk about where the rabbi had and the historian had, and it's a fundamental belief in Judaism there's a God who runs the world and everything that happens in the physical world, for good or for bad, is somehow related on a metaphysical level to our relationship with God. And when bad things happen this is a fundamental, important point to understand in Jewish world, you ask up by, as we call it Bad things happening to us are always on some level of manifestation of us not keeping our side of the bar. That's right and how we're dealing with each other. So I'm saying, as Jews, it is so important. There's so many Jews who are lost from Judaism. Good Jews for every ism, but Judaism even showing up at pro Hamas rallies and screaming because it's just Jews, oh, we care about everyone, but everyone's right, yeah, so obviously, the more a Jew is connected to Judaism, is Jewish identity, the more likely he or she will be connected to Israel and support Israel. That's an important thing. We have to recognize that we are living in the diaspora, the exile which, by the way, is a punishment, even though it's very comfortable. Possibly in living in Maryland, somewhere in California, in New York, exile can be pretty comfortable, but it's still a punishment. And the Talmud says.
Ken Spiro:The rabbis tell us that the second temple was destroyed because of causeless hatred of one Jew for another. And causeless hatred is an interesting idea. No one hates another person for no reason. I just hate you, no, no, because this hatred is. You really don't do anything to me, but I disagree with you. I don't like the way your world. You could be a really small thing, by the way, yeah, and I'm gonna. I'm gonna. Instead of folks who want to unite you and I together, we're gonna fight amongst ourselves.
Ken Spiro:And I saw this coming. I was saying this for my gosh yes, israel before all this, and now we just forgot about it. I know, but what went on with the last elections and judicial reform and the country splitting and the protests and not thank God, not big violence and looting, but a lot of unrest with the police and blocking highways. I'm saying God is sitting there saying my children, I can't stand to see trying to kill each other. I'm gonna send Gentiles to do it, and I've seen this over and over again from my historians perspective. That almost all first. If you thought a second and defy that.
Ken Spiro:When we start fighting amongst ourselves. That's when the external pressure begins, because when that happens anyone here sees this in the Jewish world, sees this suddenly we put all our differences aside, everything. It's quiet, no one's honking on the street, everyone's waiting in lines, people are helping each other. Because then we realized that you know what the people hate us. Don't give a damn about what we believe, what kind of keep, how we wear, whether we keep kosher or not, whether a right-wing or left-wing, republican or Democrat in Auschwitz, there's only one line. And why does it take people to kill us to get us to recognize that? So now we're unified, we're ready to fight the big. My big fear and was when this is over and we'll win. Unfortunately, we're gonna pay a heavy price, for we've already paid a very heavy price.
Ken Spiro:It's the largest loss of Jewish life since the Holocaust. We're gonna go like a fight each other again, yeah, so we need to make a paradigm shift Internally, individually and collectively, in that we are all part of the Jewish people. We could agree to disagree. You know, any parent gets this line, especially if you're teenagers. You don't always like your kids, but you always love them. That's why you let them live to go to college. I don't have to agree with you. You're my brother, you're my sister, I love you and I got to respect you. Yeah, we got to agree to disagree and we got to be together on this and we have your admission. We got to focus all that incredible energy and drive we have on a mission that all Jews can get into.
Coach Ratner:OK, let's, let's answer the question. We, what we can do physically, we did. We talked about what we do spiritually. What can we do as people? Now, for me, the last time, and I say for me personally, to I talk my Jewish brother and America, I'm like to my, I'm like you know what, it'd be great if you could keep shoppers. You know, one of the greatest messes in the Torah I've mentioned 37, 38 times is taking Shabbos, and it is, it is a spiritual dynamo when a family spends time together, gets off of the social media, gets off of the news, and I think that you can't keep a whole Shabbos, keep part of whatever you can do. I think that is a for me spiritually. I think definitely how it's going to do.
Ken Spiro:Yeah, by the way, it's great to get off the news now a day, because everyone's glued to it and it just gives you anxiety. Oh my gosh, I have to make it.
Coach Ratner:But the bottom line is. By the way, this is the reason why I'm doing this and I'm doing this podcast, because I can't. I have to do something. I can't write to the home and wait for the studio. This is why I'm not in the studio now. I'm in people departments because I want to do something to help the world. I want to do something to help the Jewish people and I and this is you know I'm writing a book on self-esteem and, thank God, I'm using some of my tools. I really need it because I have been severe anxiety. I let. Now I need to get in the army, you know like, but still it's really hard for me.
Ken Spiro:Yeah, well, again, that's your, your great example of what you can do, because whatever ability you have, if you're an influencer, you can speak Whatever we can do, which is why I'm doing what I'm doing. But to get back to your answer, we all have to get back to doing what the Jewish people are supposed to do. There's a lot of confusion about that on the on the non-Orthodox world. It's just to be used for social justice. Social justice is a part of Judaism, but it's not Judaism. Often in the Orthodox world it's.
Ken Spiro:I got to just do more prayers. Prayer is amazing. We have to have right. I got to keep more kosher and I got to keep stricter Shabbat. I got to dress more modestly. No, we got to recognize. The job of the Jewish people from our very beginning is to be a role model for the world. God says be holy, because I'm holy. What does holiness mean? Holiness means to be Godlike, to live and act in a way that God would be happy with us. Yes, you know, we're doing stuff. Rebnach Weimberg, my Rosh Hashim. He used to say he was a little kid, he was thinking of doing something questionable. His father would say in Yiddish no, no, no, let's look at what he thinks.
Coach Ratner:God thinks about that one. I would say it lives through the lives of God Exactly. Judaism is not a religion. Judaism is a relationship. It's about a relationship with God. But if I'm acting away, you think God would like me to act like this way. You think God wants me to yell at my wife? You think God wants me to curse? You think God gives us this amazing mouth. We have many languages we can speak and you know, do you want I hate to say crap come in your mouth and people speak, especially younger people. I used to do the same thing first, all the time. I mean, not that, it's just, it's trash. You're letting you know and think about every action you make in your life. Does God want me to act this way, exactly?
Ken Spiro:And I really think and we've had this conversation before it's all about balance. Yeah, because being holy is often, especially in a religious world, viewed as being more keeping stringencies with the big guy, which is good we all need. We're all on a ladder. Whether you're completely, you know, jew for every ism but Judaism, or the most Orthodox Jew living in May, shereem and Brunei Brahm, we're all in the same ladder. We have to all be moving up. So you're thinking about keeping Shabbat. Take something upon yourself that connects you spiritually. Prayer is a great thing, you know Shabbat, even if it's not the whole Shabbat. Start Friday night, turn the TV off in your, in your phone off for two hours and sit and have a meal and be spiritual and focused. But also remember that we have to proactively look for opportunities to be doing good in this world, to be representing the Jewish people in the way God wants us to be acting. What if you're?
Coach Ratner:not Jewish. I have a lot of non-Jewish friends. I went to Mary Washington College, went to Groveton High School. I have a lot of friends, so I've been. I've said, I've put something on Facebook recently that they should pray, pray for the Jewish people. Yeah, Anyone can pray anytime day, anywhere in the world, as much as you want, as little as you want. Talk to God. Yeah, Send him, send you, ask him to, to send healing and salvation to the Jewish people and to Israel.
Ken Spiro:Right and we don't. We don't have a monopoly on relationship with God.
Coach Ratner:God is very important, everybody, everybody's in a relationship with God.
Ken Spiro:Right, jewish, not, it doesn't matter. Right, we're all His children. We just have a unique responsibility as an intermediary between God and humanity.
Coach Ratner:We're like the crossing guards in the poor way.
Ken Spiro:Exactly, we're held to a higher level of accountability, but it's the same. It's the same game plan for humanity. It's all about having a relationship with God. So, to the extent that any human being decides they want to live in truth and live in reality and, by the way, the litmus test for this is like that book, the Israel test by George Gilder what you think about Israel is largely sort of like the barometer for how, in reality, you are. That's a great, he said. That's the real test, that's the Israel test. So my non-Jewish friends and I have a lot of them are right wing Christians, but I can see it's precisely. They're kind of holding in the same place I am, precisely because they believe there's good and there's bad, there's evil, there's righteousness. God gave us a system of how to behave and the best way to demonstrate this is by supporting the Jewish people at Israel, whatever way I can like we talked about before. I also showed you you know there's a lot more non-Jews out there, could be a lot more influential in terms of politics and public opinion and financial support than there are Jews. There's only maybe 14, 15 million of us and there are hundreds of millions of non-Jews in the world who could be doing this.
Ken Spiro:You can take a side, you can help. You know you can be a supporter. We Jews don't believe you can. Only Jews get the habit. Righteous people go to have it. We're stuck with the responsibility. But no one likes that word, responsibility. Responsibility is a very. I just want to like do what feels good. But it's such an important point and they're asking me too what can I do? And I tell me exact same thing. I tell my Jewish friends be a better human being, be more God-like. It's not just for Jews to be God-like. Support, do the things you could do. Support Israel politically, support Israel public opinion, support Israel on social media, give money, go out to rallies.
Ken Spiro:I'm telling you that is the real tide that has to be turned, because the world is dividing and now people are picking sides. Am I going to be on the side of truth and reality and absolute values and goodness and godliness? Am I going to be on the side of, you know, falsehood, basically delusion, and ultimately that, even though a lot of these people are not evil, it leads to evil. Moral relativism and lack of clarity will lead to Auschwitz. That's what happens. That's what the world used to be like before.
Ken Spiro:We brought the idea of one God and absolute morality into the world, and that's the issue that is teetering on the brink now in humanity, and humanity is being asked through this conflict like a bullseye, the extent that a person is more on target and focusing on the bullseye and understand what's really at stake here, which is not the survival of a little state of Israel, but the triumph of truth over falsehood, of good over evil. That is the real struggle here, and people have thick sides. That's 100 percent what's going on and that's where the non-Jewish world needs to decide what side they're on Alright.
Coach Ratner:Thank you, ken, that was amazing. I really appreciate you coming on. I know it's a very hard time, it's very hard to talk about. We have to get the message out there that you can do something. And those two things One is physical gift these organizations we mentioned and number two is spiritual. If you're Jewish, you're not Jewish. If you're Jewish, you obviously pray and you do the three parts of the body and you send blessings to the Jewish people. And if you're not Jewish, you pray to God and become a better person, be a moral person and try to change the world, because if you're trying to change the world, let the world change you. Thank you very much. This is the Living Clarity Podcast.