THE JEWISH KABBALAH:
ROOT OF MIDEAST VIOLENCE
By Rev. Ted Pike
In the aftermath of Israel’s blitz of Lebanon, banners were
lifted by pro-Hezbollah youth to the TV media. They labeled Lebanese
wreckage as: “Made in America.”
It’s true: Israel’s F-16s, cluster bombs, and arms
were supplied by America. But the intention to use them was created
deep in the heart of Talmudic Judaism—in the semi-secret “Kabbalah."
What is Kabbalah? Today, "Kabbalah" makes most think
of popstars like Madonna or Britney Spears who dabble in the occult.
Actually, Kabbalah has no real relevance to Gentiles. It is an occult
theology and practice centering around the superiority of Jews and
their predestined purpose to dominate society.
While conservatives focus on the dark side of Islam, they take
it for granted that Judaism is a benign religion of peace and tolerance.
But if we are brave enough to take a closer look, we find a very,
very different reality. Deep in the heart of Judaism’s sacred
texts lie a set of twisted and chilling beliefs.
Two “Gods” in Judaism
In the Old Testament, God is a conscious moral being. He has perfect
knowledge of right and wrong, and He judges us according to our free
moral choices.
Yet when the Jews were carried to distant Babylon in 587 BC by
Nebuchadnezzar, they found a very different god. They discovered
the pantheistic god of the east—a world force who is “great” not
because he loves or is good, but because of his pervasive power everywhere.
The ancient Pharisees liked this “god” because he didn’t
disapprove of their perversion of Jehovah’s laws. The Pharisees
of Babylon created an elaborate secret theology for the Jews called “Kabbalah.”
Eminent Christian-Jewish historian Alfred Eidersheim comments, “It
is undeniable that already at the time of Jesus Christ, there existed
an assemblage of doctrines and speculations that were carefully concealed
from the multitude. They were not even revealed to ordinary scholars…This
kind bore the name of Kabbala…” 1
In Kabbalist theology, “God,” called the “En
Sof,” is beyond rational description. He consists of the most
exalted, rarified light. As his wavelengths descend, they manifest
themselves, according to Jewish Kabbalists, as a most wonderful phenomenon:
the Jewish people. Jews, being semi-divine, are the rational, physical
manifestations of God’s presence in the universe. They are
as indispensable to the existence of the universe as a proton is
to an atom.
Evil Gentiles
Unfortunately, the wavelengths of God continue to descend, becoming
so degenerate that they produce demons and—most troubling to
Israel— satanic creatures called “Kliphoth,” or
Gentiles. The rabbinic treatise, “Sepher Or Israel, 117,” recommends: “Take
the life of the Klipoth and kill them, and you will please God the
same as one who offers incense to Him.” 2
The Zohar, meaning “brightness” or “light,” is
the five-volume repository of Kabbalistic lore and mystic speculation.
It explains, “… ‘living soul’ refers to
Israel who have holy, living souls from above, and ‘cattle’ and ‘creeping
thing’ and ‘beast of the earth’ to the other peoples
who are not ‘living soul.’…” 3
Bad Vibrations
According to the Zohar, the great tragedy of this world is that
the Kliphoth or Gentiles perpetually unsettle the higher levels with
their evil imbalance. As long as the Kliphoth continue to exist in
their present state of discord, God and His universe will be disordered
as well.
In this concept we find a rationale for the Kabbalists’ hatred
of Gentiles. Christ said, “The time cometh that whosoever killeth
you will think that he doeth God service.” (John 16:2) The
Kabbalist sees the extermination of the Gentile as a necessary process
toward restoring order in the universe. He teaches that the Gentile
is a form of demon who should be treated with no more genuine benevolence
than one would treat Satan himself.
Gentiles, whom the Zohar describes as “Amalekites,” have
an intrinsic tendency to disorder the world, causing it to revert
to its primordial state of chaos (tohu) and emptiness (bohu).
“All of these [Gentiles] tend to bring the world back to
the state of tohu and bohu, and they caused the destruction of the
temple. But as “tohu” and “bohu” gave place
to the light, so, when God reveals Himself, they will be wiped off
the earth. But, withal, redemption will not be complete until Amalek
will be exterminated.” 4
“The People of the Earth are idolaters, and it has been written
about them: Let them be wiped off the face of the earth.” 5
Long-Suffering Israel
Until the blessed day when the Gentiles are exterminated, the Zohar
says, Israel must remain in a withered, blighted condition. This
is because Gentiles, by the confusion they stir up in the lower levels,
prevent the blessings of the Shekina in the upper levels from adequately
descending upon Israel.
Someday, however, things will be as they were meant and “man” (meaning
Israel) will be given the preeminence he was created to enjoy. Then,
says the Kabbalah, “man should be unique and ruler over all.” 6
How will “man” conquer the world?
“Rabbi Jehuda said to him Rabbi Chezkia: “He is to
be praised who is able to free himself from the enemies of Israel,
and the just are much to be praised who get free from them and fight
against them.” Rabbi Chezkia asked, “How must we fight
against them?” Rabbi Jehuda said, “By wise counsel thou
shalt war against them.” (Proverbs 24:6) “By what kind
of war?” “The kind of war that every son of man must
war against his enemies. Which Jacob used against Esau—by deceit
and trickery wherever possible. They must be fought against without
ceasing, until proper order be restored. Thus it is with satisfaction
that I say we should free ourselves from them, and rule over them.”” 7
The intention of this passage is clear: world domination.
World Domination
When Jews control the planet, Kabbalists believe, God’s power
will be manifest through the Messiah. “The Holy One, blessed
be He, will display His force, and exterminate them [Gentiles] from
the world.” 8
In that day, “happy will be the lot of Israel, whom the Holy
One, blessed be He, has chosen from amongst the Goyim of whom the
Scriptures say: “Their work is vanity, it is an illusion at
which we must laugh; they will perish when God visits them in his
wrath.” At the moment when the Holy One, blessed be He, will
exterminate all the Goyim of the world, Israel alone will subsist
even as it is written: “The Lord alone will appear great on
that day.”” 9
Until then, the Kabbalah has a solemn mission: “It is certain
that our captivity will last until the princes of the Gentiles who
worship idols are destroyed.” 10
To hasten the end of Israel’s captivity, Kabbalah recommends
extermination of Gentiles, not simply as a necessity, but as the
highest religious duty. Zohar II explains the principles of redemption
of the firstborn of an ass by offering a lamb: “The ass means
non-Jew, who is to be redeemed by the offering of a lamb, which is
the dispersed sheep of Israel. But if he refuses to be redeemed,
then break his skull…They should be taken out of the book
of the living…” 11
“In the palaces of the fourth heaven are those who lamented
over Sion and Jerusalem and all those who destroyed idolatrous nations…and
those who killed off people who worshipped idols are clothed in purple
garments so that they may be recognized and honored.” 12
To the Kabbalist, even the quaint and commonplace liturgy of the
synagogue has a deep, far-reaching significance: “The feast
of tabernacles is the period when Israel triumphs over the other
peoples of the world. That is why during this feast we seize the
loulab and carry it as a trophy to show that we have conquered all
the other people known as ‘populace’…” 13
Kabbalah Today
How relevant is the Kabbalah to modern Judaism?
Although many Jews today have become so secularized that they have
forgotten most of their own beliefs, as well as the literature which
is supposed to uphold them, observant Jews, including Conservative,
Orthodox and especially ultra-Orthodox, still consider the Kabbalah
inspired by God. They believe it stands with the Talmud as the greatest
legal authority of Judaism. In fact, passages from the Zohar are
read along with the Bible and Talmud as part of the worship service
in synagogues every Saturday.
The Concise History of Judaism describes the Zohar as “inspired
Jewish writings.” The preface to the Soncino edition of the
Zohar says: “The Zohar appeals to many Jews in a way that makes
them regard it as the most sacred of sacred books! For it mirrors
Judaism as an intensely vital religion of the spirit. More overpoweringly
than any other book or code, more even than the Bible, does it give
to the Jew the conviction of an inner, unseen spiritual universe—an
eternal moral order.” (p. 12)
The same source continues, “During the present century there
has been a distinct revival of interest…in Kabbalah, and eminent
Jewish scholars have attempted to show that these devotees of the
mystic side of Jewish life and religion were not, as is popularly
supposed, half-crazy visionaries living in a universe peopled by
the figments of their own degenerate brains, but men of intellect,
scholarship and sound sense who aimed at bringing back to Jewish
organized communal life a breath of that mystic sentiment and emotion
which are the aromatic life essence of religion, and which are indispensable
to Judaism if it is to continue to play its predestined part of bringing
mankind “under the wings of the Shekinah.”” (p.
25)
The Kabbalah is thought to be divinely inspired by many Jews because,
like the Talmud, it proceeded from the very hub of Jewry—the
most eminent rabbis. Many of the greatest Talmudists, from Ben Zakki
and Maimonides through the numerous Baal-shems and Talmudists of
the 16th through 18th centuries, even to perhaps the greatest rabbi
in the world today, Rabbi Steinsaltz of Jerusalem—all have
been initiates and practitioners of Kabbalah. They take the Kabbalah
very seriously, indeed, as the Word of God.
What about the Kabbalah’s description of Gentiles as animals
who must be slaughtered before “order” can be restored?
That concept is not a minority opinion but fundamental to how Kabbalah
structures God, Israel, and the universe. Thus, we can only assume
it provides much of the motivation for the racist laws, war crimes,
and homicidal agenda of the state of Israel today. After all, Orthodox,
Kabbalah-venerating Judaism is the official position of the government,
religious hierarchy, and military of Israel.
Know Your “Friends”
There is now an accelerating interest among conservatives and Christians
in what the Koran teaches about “infidels.” Many are
eager to discuss how the inner teachings of Islam’s most sacred
literature might help explain international Arab terrorism.
Yet, incredibly, the evangelical right has no interest in similar
investigations into the sacred, semi-secret teachings of Judaism.
No one is curious about how such teachings might help explain not
only Israel’s notorious mistreatment of her Arab neighbors
but also Jewish power worldwide in government, finance, and media.
This must change. Israel is in the public domain. If Israel expects
America to contribute $5 billion annually, sustaining her as the
world’s fourth greatest military superpower, then Jews must
no longer cry “Anti-semitism!” whenever their most sacred
literature, the Talmud and Zohar, are investigated.
If America is to keep from being pawned into even greater military
and public relations disasters in the Middle East, we must have an
accurate understanding of the beliefs of those we are committed to
defend.
Yes, the bombs that fell on Lebanon were made in America. But the
hatred and racism behind them were made in Israel.
Endnotes:
1
Eidersheim, Alfred. La Societe Juive au Temps
de Jesus, p. 363,
364, with select quotes translated by Nesta Webster, Secret
Societies and Subversive Movements, p. 10.
2 Pranaitus,
Rev. I. B. The Talmud Unmasked, p.82.
3 Zohar I, Bereshith
47a, Soncino translation. This is the authoritative five-volume
English edition of the Zohar translated by Maurice and Sperling.
4 Zohar I, Bereshith
25b.
5 Zohar I, 25a,
Pranaitus.
6 Zohar I, Bereshith
47a.
7 Zohar I, Bereshith
160a, Pranaitus, p. 74-75. The Soncino version of this passage,
contained in Vol. 2, Vayeze 160a, says the same thing but in less
pointed language. Scholars of the Hebrew and Aramaic language have
translated this and other passages of the Zohar for me from the
authoritative Mantuan edition of the Zohar, 16th century, which
resides in the Judaic section of the Library of Congress. Their
conclusion is that in the case of volatile passages the Pranaitus
translations are consistently superior to the Soncino. In such
passages which cannot be omitted, Soncino’s practice is to
tone them down by paraphrasing or omitting them entirely.
8 Zohar III,
Schemoth 7 and 9b, DePauly translation. Nesta Webster presents
selected quotes in English from the French DePauly translation
of the Zohar, in her Secret Societies and
Subversive Movements.
The original DePauly translation is available in the Judaic section
of the Library of Congress.
9 Zohar, Sec.
Vayschlah Folio 177b, DePauly translation.
10 Zohar I, 219b,
Pranaitus p. 80.
11 Zohar II,
43a.
12 Zohar I, 38b
and 39a.
13 Zohar, Toldoth
Noah, 63b.
