TEN QUESTIONS TO TEST YOUR TORAH KNOWLEDGE RELEVANT
TO BASELESS HATRED

1. What is the relationship between the two classic commandments found in two successive verses:
“Thou shall not hate thy brother in thy heart” (Lev 19:17) and
“Thou shall love your fellow as yourself” (Lev 19:18)  
See page 45.

2. What do the five daughters of Tzelofchad teach us about Joseph?
See page 62.

3. What do we learn about Joseph from the numerical value of his name?
See page 62.

4. As soon as Moses became adult, he went toward his enslaved brothers to share their burdens (Exodus 2:11). How did Moses acquire the trait of empathy?
See pages 69-70.

5. Aharon had the function of high priest. At the same time, he had the role of peace maker among the Jewish people. Is there a link between these two functions?
See page 71.

6. What special arrangement was made between the land portions of the tribes of Judah and Benjamin?
See page 71.

7. What is the “rationale” for the law of “returning a lost object”, according to Abarbanel?
See page 73.

8. How did Esther respond to Haman’s critical characterization of the Jewish people?
See page 75.

9. When King David founded Jerusalem, he collected funds from each of the twelve tribes. What Torah verse did he rely on?
See page 77.

10. Who is the author of the following statement pertaining to “hurting others verbally”?

“….For the Torah was exceedingly particular about wrong inflicted with words, because this is something very hard for the heart of people to bear and a great many persons care more about this than about [being wronged] in matters of property.”
See page 185.

TEN PRINCIPLES OF BASELESS HATRED

1. Hatred is a programmed human emotion originally meant to help us avoid threats to our survival.  Hatred has been called “the ugliest of human traits” and is seen by experts as the source of most human problems.

2. Jews have a specific biblical prohibition against nurturing hatred: “Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thy heart” (Lev 19:17). In addition, Talmudic sages warned specifically against the dangers of “baseless hatred” (in Hebrew “Sinat Chinam”) among Jews.

3. To differentiate baseless hatred from generic hatred, the following definition is proposed: “baseless hatred is an unfair, excessive, and avoidable reaction by one Jew that transforms another Jew into an enemy and thereby destroys the integrity of the Jewish people.”

4. Baseless hatred is lethal to the Jewish people because of the “Hatred-Exile Paradigm”

5. The “Hatred-Exile Paradigm” includes five steps:

(i)  Hatred destroys the capacity of empathy (the ability to experience another person’s emotions)

(ii) Without empathy, a Jew loses the capacity of Arevut (“mutual             responsibility”).

(iii) Taking responsibility one for another (Arevut) defines the most             essential relationship between Jews and represents the core component of their peoplehood.

(iv) When Arevut is lost, peoplehood is destroyed; the Jewish people turns  into groups of individuals.

(v) When peoplehood is destroyed, Jews lose the title to the Land of Israel;  when the Jews do not constitute one people, there is no need for a land.

6. The divisive effects of the Hatred-Exile Paradigm can be reversed by the “Judah Principle”. Our forefather Judah showed, for the first time, that mutual responsibility (arevut) is the remedy for baseless hatred (Gen 43:9, 44:33).

7. For the State of Israel, the Judah principle of Arevut is not just a moral imperative but also a survival strategy.

8. For Jews in Israel, what happens at the micro-social level cannot be distinguished from the macro-social; therefore what are apparently private issues can acquire a national dimensions.

9. The time has come for Jews in Israel and the Diaspora to focus on eliminating baseless hatred within families (siblings, parents, and in-laws), in the workplace, among neighbors, friends, and within the broader societal circle.

10. Prevention and repair of baseless hatred episodes can be achieved by developing the capacity of empathy that leads to Arevut.