RSS
Examining the History of Mount Gerizim: The Samaritans’ Holy Temple
Reading from a Torah scroll in accordance with Sephardi tradition. Photo: Sagie Maoz via Wikimedia Commons.
After two weeks of the most important laws of the Torah, Moses now gives instructions about what the Jewish people should do when they enter the land of Israel.
The first command concerns first fruits. Moses says that since they now have a land of their own, the Jewish people should dedicate their first harvest to God, out of gratitude.
The Torah specifies that we should take them to, “the place which God has chosen to be the repository of his name,” which was taken to mean the Tabernacle (which, in due course, would be transferred into a permanent temple). Then the Torah goes on to command them to erect two stone tablets and cover them with plaster, onto which the laws of the Torah would be written for all to see. This was an important signal that the law had to be accessible to everyone.
This would be followed by a public ceremony that would take place on the West Bank at two mountains, Gerizim for the blessings, and Eyval for the curses. The tribes would be divided into two, with half on one and the other half on the other. They would say aloud the blessings that would follow if they were true to God, and the curses that would follow if they abandoned him.
I do not like the translation of blessings and curses. Rather, I believe we should emphasize that good things or bad things will happen depending on people’s behavior. The Torah is emphasizing that for a country, a people, or a community to function effectively, the laws are not enough. The spirit of the law is what matters, and the relationship between people is what will bring blessings as opposed to what will bring curses.
Returning to the two mountains, Gerizim and Eyval, King David conquered Jerusalem roughly 3,000 years ago, and his son Solomon built the temple there. Why was no temple built on Mount Gerizim, which was specified in the Torah? Some 300 years later, the country split into two kingdoms, Judah in the South and Israel in the north. In 720 BCE the north was destroyed by the Assyrians, and its inhabitants were exiled and scattered around the empire, which extended from the Euphrates River eastwards. Other peoples defeated by the Assyrians were then resettled in that conquered territory to make sure that the original inhabitants would not re-constitute.
According to our Bible, some of these other conquered people settled in the north, Samaria, and became known as Samaritans. And they adopted the Torah as their religious authority, but built their temple on Mount Gerizim in the north.
The Samaritan version of their origins is different from ours, in that they claim they were the remnant of the Ten Lost Tribes of the North who managed to hide from the Assyrians, and reconstituted the community in the absence of the Judeans. The rivalry between the Jews and the Samaritans continued until the Roman exile, and was sometimes close and sometimes distant.
Mount Gerizim, which is near Nablus on the West Bank, remains their holy place to this day — even though their temple was destroyed by the Maccabean King John Hyrcanus, and later by the Byzantine Christians. To this day, there are still small communities of Samaritans in Samaria as well as settlements in Holon in Israel and in parts of America.
And it might seem from this week’s Torah portion that their choice of Holy Mountain was more authentic than ours.
The other is a writer and rabbi, currently based in New York.
The post Examining the History of Mount Gerizim: The Samaritans’ Holy Temple first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
US Moves Patriot Missile Batteries from South Korea to Middle East
A Patriot missile battery. Photo: IDF.
i24 News – American Patriot missile defense batteries will be moved from South Korea to the Middle East, according to reports in Asian media on Friday, amid speculation over a potential military action against Iran’s nuclear program and escalating bombardments of Iran-backed jihadists in Yemen.
US President Donald Trump threatened Iran on Sunday with bombing and secondary tariffs if Tehran did not come to an agreement with Washington over its nuclear program, and the United States has moved additional warplanes into the region.
Washington and Seoul have reportedly recently agreed on the “monthslong” partial deployment of the Patriot Advanced Capability-3, in what is understood to be the first known case involving the relocation of United States Forces Korea (USFK) assets to the Middle East.
Iran in recent years has largely dropped the pretense of enriching uranium for a civilian atomic energy program, as it’s reportedly teetering on the nuclear precipice. Israel believes that a nuclear Iran represents a grave existential threat, consistent with the exterminationist antisemitism of the Islamic Republic’s anti-Israel rhetoric.
After the election of Trump, a known Iran hawk, the likelihood of an U.S.-Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities has increased precipitously.
The post US Moves Patriot Missile Batteries from South Korea to Middle East first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Report: Iranian Plot to Assassinate Azerbaijani Rabbi Foiled
The Azerbaijani capital of Baku. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
i24 News – Iran enlisted the services of a Georgian drug trafficker to carry out an assassination of a prominent Azerbaijani rabbi, the Washington Post reported Saturday, citing security officials.
The plot to murder Rabbi Shneor Segal, foiled by the State Security Service of Azerbaijan in early January, also involved a plan to attack a Jewish education center, the officials said.
The plot was set in motion by an officer with Iran’s Quds Force, who met with Georgian criminal Agil Aslanov, handing him a photo of Segal and detailed instructions on how to murder him, the officials cited by WaPo said. Aslanov’s fee for the foiled hit was $200,000.
The State Security Service said the two men “worked to collect information about a member of a religious community, and sent the location of his residence and workplace to a representative of a foreign special service agency via the appropriate mobile phone application.”
Iran is known to be behind multiple plots against Israeli and Jewish targets, many of which have been foiled by Israeli and foreign security services.
However a recent plot saw three citizens of Uzbekistan murder an Israeli rabbi in the United Arab Emirates on Iranian orders. The three were sentenced to death earlier this week for the murder of Zvi Kogan in November.
The post Report: Iranian Plot to Assassinate Azerbaijani Rabbi Foiled first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Netanyahu to Depart for Washington on Sunday Directly from Hungary to Meet with Trump
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends a joint press conference with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio at the Prime Minister’s office in Jerusalem, Feb. 16, 2025. Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg/Pool via REUTERS
i24 News – Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will depart to Washington DC on Sunday directly from Hungary—where he is presently on an official visit—to meet with US President Donald Trump, i24NEWS learned on Saturday from an Israeli source.
The visit comes following a phone conversation between the leaders on Friday, and a call with State Secretary Marco Rubio a short while ago.
As a result, the planned visit to Washington of Israel’s Defense Minister Israel Katz will be postponed once again.
Topics of discussion between the two leaders are expected to include the possible military action against Iran’s nuclear facilities, the Gaza war and the future of the war-ravaged Palestinian enclave, the US bombing campaign against Iran-backed Houthi jihadists in Yemen, and the recent imposition of tariffs on Israeli products.
The post Netanyahu to Depart for Washington on Sunday Directly from Hungary to Meet with Trump first appeared on Algemeiner.com.