In the Torah we read that Bilam wanted to curse the Jewish people, but he ended up blessing them. He said:
How can I curse whom G-d has not cursed? How can I anger whom G-d has not angered?
For from the top of the rocks I see him, and from the hills I look at him.”
Explanation: From the high mountains I see them. From the hills I watch them.
Rashi: I am looking at their foundations: the fathers are “rocks” and the mothers are “hills.” Because of these strong roots, I cannot harm them.
“Behold, it is a nation that will dwell alone, and will not be counted among the nations.”
This is a nation that lives apart, separate from the other nations. It does not see itself as just one of them.
This is how things looked for hundreds of years of persecution and pogroms in Europe. This is how it looked during the Holocaust. And this is sometimes how it looks today for the State of Israel and its defenders around the world. We find ourselves alone.
So how can we understand this? What does it mean to be “alone”? Is that really a blessing?
The word alone reminds us of negative things in the Torah:
It is not good for man to be alone — Genesis 2:18
And again, when Yitro saw Moshe judging the people by himself:
The thing you are doing is not good — Exodus 18:17
You cannot live alone and succeed. You cannot lead alone. It is not good to be alone. Loneliness is not a blessing. It is the opposite.
The word alone appears in two other places, both very negative:
In the law of the metzora: “He shall dwell alone, outside the camp shall be his home” — Leviticus 13:46
In the opening of Megillat Eicha: “How does she sit alone” — Lamentations 1:1
The only place where this word appears in a positive way is about G-d:
G-d alone guided them — Deuteronomy 32:12. And that is for clear religious reasons.
So is alone really about being hated by the world?
Nowhere in the Tanach does it say that the Jewish people are meant to be a hated nation. The opposite is true. The prophets said that a day will come when all the nations will come to be blessed through the spirit of the Jewish people.
Yeshayahu said:
In the end of days, the mountain of G-d’s house will be established at the top of the mountains... and all the nations will flow to it. Many peoples will go and say: Come, let us go up to the mountain of G-d, to the house of the G-d of Yaakov. He will teach us His ways and we will walk in His paths. For from Zion will go out Torah, and the word of G-d from Jerusalem — Isaiah 2:3
Zechariah said:
In those days, ten men from all the languages of the nations will grab hold of the corner of a Jewish man’s garment and say: We will go with you, for we have heard that G-d is with you — Zechariah 8:23
And in many cases, we do care what the nations think. We say “Why should the nations say”. So do we care about the nations or not?
I think it is also a dangerous way of thinking to say, “They hate us anyway, so why bother? Why act? It’s fate.”
The answer is: Yes, there is hatred. But we can and must act to change it, or at least to make the hatred softer.
Look at the famous teaching of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai that everyone quotes: “Esav hates Yaakov.”
Remember, Yaakov was afraid that Esav wanted to kill him. After taking safety measures, and after his night struggle with the angel, the meeting happened. The verse says:
And Esav ran toward him and hugged him and fell on his neck and kissed him, and they cried — Genesis 33:4
The Mesorah adds dots above the word and he kissed him — a sign that this word has special meaning. Here Rashi brings Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai: “It is a rule: It is known that Esav hates Yaakov. But at that moment his mercy was awakened, and he kissed him with all his heart.”
The same teaching that people quote to prove antisemitism is the way of the world actually proves the opposite. In the critical moment, Esav did not feel hatred for Yaakov. They met, they hugged, and they parted in peace.
So the blessing is definitely not to be alone.
Rather, even when we are alone and we fight not to be alone, we still need to remember that our job is harder than all other nations. And even a small success for us is really a huge success. And always feel that each one of us is an ambassador for our small nation, to represent it in the world. And to remember that even in hard times, even in exile, we are still connected.
Like Rav Hirsch writes on this verse:
We are a group defined by shared memories and shared responsibility. We “are not counted among the nations” because we can survive even without being a “nation” — without a country, and even in exile and scattered. The strength of the Jewish people is not in nationalism, but in building a society based on justice and human dignity.
We all hope and pray for the day when the nations will realize their mistake, and antisemitism in the world will end.
Amen.
Rabbi Eliyahu Tal