In our "open" society where everything our parents believed in and died for is open for debate; where the "other perspective" is always entertained; where the more immoral, racist, or sadistic the speaker at the podium is, the greater the round of applause he receives from our "educated elite," I fear for the future.

When a Holocaust denier is debated on campus, an alarm must ringWhen a Holocaust denier is debated on campus, when Hitler is portrayed as a person with his own "point of view," when Ahmadinejad is invited to share his rants on Ivy League colleges, an alarm must ring.

Sometimes I wonder if the open-minded loyalists aren't in truth closed minded, by the mere fact that they cannot entertain the thought that the "old-schoolers" had anything right, so they must shatter the taboo, must hear the radicals, and must applaud the morally corrupt.


The Torah reading of Emor opens with the following verse (Leviticus 21:1):

"G‑d said to Moses: Say to the priests, Aaron's sons, and you shall say to them: 'Let no priest become ritually impure through contact with a dead person...'"

Why does the verse repeat itself—"Say to the priests... and you shall say to them"? Answers the Talmud: "The redundant wording is intended to enjoin the adults with regards to minors." I.e., the adults must ensure that the young priests also retain their ritual purity.

This is the first time in the Torah that G‑d commands the Jewish people to educate their children. And about what? Regarding ritual impurity.

What is the logic behind ritual impurity? Why does contact with a corpse (or any other ritual-impurity generating substance) cause spiritual "defilement"? We don't know. G‑d has chosen not to share with us the rationale.

Are unexplained commandments the first thing to teach a child? Should we not first present then with the commonsense laws, and only after we have convinced them regarding the beauty and logic of the Torah and its laws, do we, with a red face and an apologetic tone, whisper to the kids about some "yet to be explained commandments" with a quick disclaimer that "these are not the prototype of religion and they must not be taken out of context"?

Absolutely not, says the Torah. A child must first and foremost know that what G‑d says we follow, no questions asked. "Na'aseh v'nishmawe will do then we will understand," said the Jews at the giving of the Torah at Sinai. Ever since, these two words have been our modus operandi and our key to survival. Blind faith, closed-minded devotion, and self sacrifice for ideals have been our method of surviving for more than 3,300 years.

Let us hold tight to the enduring stump of our ancient religion and valuesQuestions are, of course, encouraged for the "people of the book"; but there are guidelines, there are taboos. And no matter where our inquiries may lead us, we know that G‑d's word is the first and last in any discussion.

If we would only educate our children with these black and white rules in their younger years, we would not cry bitter tears when Ahmadinejad gets a standing ovation from our future doctors, lawyers and politicians.

Let us reclaim our innocence. Let us hold tight to the enduring stump of our ancient religion and values, and not to the falling leaves of the "isms."

Not everything is up for debate.