When I was in graduate school, I dated a Catholic (with both a capital C and a lowercase one) girl. She gave me a book one year for a gift. It wasn’t just any book; it was a book she had read while she was still in high school. According to her, it was a book that changed her worldview and gave her insight into a topic she never expected to be interested in. Having attended Catholic school and grown up in a suburban Midwestern town, she knew very few Jews. In fact, when we met in 1996, I was the first real Jewish friend she had ever had. Fortunately, she was smart enough to know that we didn’t have horns or anything like that, but she still knew very little about the religion or the culture or the people. I am pleased to say that she is quite knowledgeable now, thanks in part to me, but also thanks in part to this book. Of course, that book was Leon Uris’s Exodus.

I dutifully read the book, and thought that it was very interesting. I must confess that I remember very little of the book 12+ years later. I do remember that I enjoyed it, and that I was glad that she had read it and understood a little better the importance to the Jews of a homeland, particularly after the Second World War and the atrocities that were afflicted upon European Jews. I am blessed that I was born in an era where anti-Semitism is at an historic low. True, there is still hate related crimes against the Jews, and, perhaps even worse, anti-Semitic sentiment still reigns, but fortunately, I have never really been personally exposed to serious anti-Semitism. I am also fortunate to have been born in the US, where arguably, I am more protected from anti-Semitism than almost anywhere else in the world. I also consider myself lucky to have been born in an era where the State of Israel has asserted her right to exist, and although too many people still die (on both sides), and there are still too many bombings, there isn’t war and the serious constant threat like from 1948 thru 1967. I have been blessed to have lived and toured Israel at a time when peace was the norm, and attacks were not…at least where I lived in Jerusalem. My friend SK may feel differently; she lived in the north and had to sit in her bomb shelter almost weekly.

I finally got around to watching Otto Preminger’s insanely long movie adaptation of Uris’s book (which was no slim novel itself). In a nutshell it was exactly what I expected. Bad acting, poor sound, obvious dubbing, and too many shadows of the cameraman (most obvious in the scene where Ari and Kitty kiss for the first time as they overlook the Valley of Jezreel). Nevertheless, it fascinated me to watch this epic unfold on my television (I can only imagine what it was like on the Big Screen). It amazed me how propagandist it was (was the book so much so as well?). How could anyone walk out of that movie and not say, “hell yea the Jews deserve their own land…and what’s with those awful Arabs? They were invited to live in peace and said no. F’ them. It’s their own fault.” Of course, the reality of the situation between the Jews and the Arabs was (and still is) much more complicated than Otto made it out to be, and there were other, centuries old forces at play.

I’m not ashamed to say that I got caught up in the moment of the movie, and I kept thinking, how exciting and romantic it would have been to be living back then, just before the birth of a nation. To be among the first generation who created a fertile, vibrant country out of sand and dust. It reminded me of what the Jewish people had to go through to get the world to have any sympathy whatsoever to allow the partition to happen, and what these same people had to go through in order to survive in an arid land with enemies on all sides. Just like the American experiment has baffled economists and historians, so, too, has the survival of Israel baffled all the naysayers. Logically, the country shouldn’t have survived the War of Independence, let alone any of the other wars. And yet, somehow it has. We could talk about God’s covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. We could talk about God’s promise that Jerusalem would never fall. We could talk about a myriad other explanations, but no matter what, the bottom line is that the State of Israel did survive, and she has prospered.

I think that the part of all of this that has been gnawing at me lately is that back then, I think everyone knew what they were fighting for. Ari claims to have dynamite strapped to the Exodus’s engines. If the British try to take the ship, he will detonate it, killing every Jewish man, woman, and child, as well as the British soldiers. When the Haganah commander finally decides that all children under 13 must return to Cypress to ensure their survival, he is reprimanded by those very children’s mothers. They would rather see their children die struggling to reach Palestine, then die behind barbed wire like some caged animal. I have heard stories that the #1 bus in Jerusalem (which takes you from town right to the Western Wall in the Old City) used to have grenades regularly lobbed into it. Back then, so the stories go, someone would immediately throw themselves upon it, sacrificing themselves to protect the rest of the bus. There’s another story I’ve been told about a soldier during the War of Independence. He was part of a demolition crew, and they were ordered to destroy a key bridge, lest the Arabs use it to get their forces across. After the explosives were set, it was discovered they had no detonators left. Knowing full well the importance of destroying the bridge, the soldier stayed behind. After giving his unit enough time to get to safety, he ignited the dynamite by hand, taking out the bridge, and himself with it. I’m not so sure that modern Israel has this sense anymore.

The Survivors—those who lived to tell the horrors of Auschwitz, Dachau, Buchenwald, and the other concentration camps—are dying. There are only a handful left. Likewise, those still alive who fought in the Haganah, the Palmach, and the Irgun are also growing fewer and fewer. The old soldiers who created the Israeli Defense Forces, the army that every other army studied because they did the impossible on a daily basis have all long since retired. The last war in Lebanon is an example of how things have changed in Israel. Ignoring America’s strong hand in the goings-on in that war for a moment, it was still clear that IDF command were at a loss of how to organize and lead a major war. This is not necessarily their fault, and ironically, it can be seen as a good thing: while almost every IDF soldier has seen some sort of combat, none, until the last war in Lebanon, had actually been to war. Israel’s current army is a mere shadow of the once fearsome army that broke the rules and impressed even its bitterest enemies. People today have forgotten what their fathers and grandfathers fought for.

This is not an argument about land for peace or anything like that. This is an argument of patriotism, of familiarity, of comfort. Israel is now 60. By strict definition, that is 2 generations. People of the current generation have forgotten what it’s like to struggle daily for Israel’s very existence. I don’t mean to negate or diminish the current situation of suicide bombers and rocket attacks from Gaza, but I would argue that this is not the same as having to stand guard 24 hours a day so that your kibbutz isn’t ambushed by the enemy. With all due respect to those who have lost loved ones in recent times, today is very peaceful compared to 60 years ago. And this has created a generation that has taken Israel’s existence for granted. Today, no one fights for Israel’s right to exist, or for its right to exist as one piece of land and not two states. Granted, there are still extremist Arab groups that still want to see the destruction of the Jewish State, but with the Jordanian and Egyptian peace accords and the official pacts, accords, and talks with the Palestinian Authority, it is becoming much more rhetorical than literal.

I am a hopeless romantic, always looking for an adventure and excitement. As with most things in my life, I was born too late. I doubt that I will ever find myself telling my grandchildren stories that grandchildren and even great grandchildren today hear from their grand- and great grandparents about what it was like in the late 1940s in Israel. I worry that I might actually have the opportunity. I believe that now is the time for the IDF to look at how it operated back then and learn from itself. If there is a 2 State agreement, I am concerned that our biggest fears will be realized and that there will be another war for independence. It took the United States 2 wars to convince the United Kingdom that we were serious about severing ties with the Empire, and it seems likely that Israel, too, will need to once again demonstrate her resolve to survive in the inhospitable climate in which she resides. Unlike the US, every war that Israel has fought has been for her very existence and independence, and a future one will be no different.

I pray that there won’t be, but, God forbid, if there is another Arab-Israel war, I pray that the old attitudes and feelings of pride will return to the Jewish people, and they will recognize and understand what they are saying as they sing HaTikvah:

I really like the concept of anthropomorphization. Sure, I understand why vegetarians and vegans get bent out of shape when they see a pig clad in chef’s hat and apron, waving a hoof, and smiling invitingly for you to enter Bob’s B*B*Q. The idea of humanizing dinner is not incredibly appealing, even to a die-hard meat eater like me. I have no problem with my meal having been a living, breathing animal not too terribly long before it was plated for me (and the less that interval, the better, for I do love a rare filet mignon or a nice juicy, medium-rare rib-eye), but I would prefer not to be reminded during that short interval that my lamb chop was crying “baa” a short time ago.

Anthropomorphization is not a new thing, nor is it any wonder it’s been around forever. Think about our ancestors. They had no science, no technology, not even Wikipedia to get answers about why the sun rises and sets, why the tides ebb and flow, or why the sky is blue. In an attempt to answer these and other questions, and to help make sense of the universe in which they lived, they created myths and lore to explain things. They created gods who not only looked like human beings (when they weren’t disguised as amorous geese or other such things), but also personified human idiosyncrasies, human quirks, and human scruples. It helped to humanize the gods so as not to be so afraid of them. It also brought godliness closer to humanity. It is no coincidence that with the creation of monotheism and the use of religion as a form of social control also came the commandments against creating idols and graven images. These monotheistic religions were not about bringing God closer to us, but bringing us closer to God. If God had human features, we would have nothing to look up to or strive to be like. Nevertheless, mere mortals that we are, we still give some human attributes to God. In the Torah, God is seen as a father figure, slow to anger, but swift to mete out punishment and justice. When Moses is allowed a glimpse of God, he sees the back of the Almighty’s very human-looking head. Later, Christians anthropomorphized God in the form of Jesus. As the Son of God he is flesh and blood, and does not engender true godliness until his death, resurrection, and Ascension. Yet, even as a man, he is unlike other humans in that he still possesses God-like features, viz.: his ability to walk on water, turn water into wine, and raise Lazarus from the dead, among many others. (God-like perhaps, but each of his miracles had been performed by mortals in the Old Testament, even his greatest miracle of all, ascension: both Enoch [“And Enoch walked with God, and he was not; for God took him.” (Gen. 5:24)] and Elijah [“and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven..” (2 Kings 2:11)] ascend.) Even today, there is as little anthropomorphization within the Abrahamic religions as possible, with Jews and Muslims refusing to create any sort of image of God, and Christians using the image of Jesus upon the cross as a reminder, rather than an idol.

Yet in other aspects of our lives, we continue to anthropomorphize all sorts of things, not just Bob’s mascot at his restaurant. How many of us have named our cars (or worse yet, our genitals)? The next time you walk to your automobile, look at it from the front: headlights are the eyes, windshield the forehead, and side mirrors the ears (I had a car we called Van Gogh because the right-side mirror had been clipped). Have you ever looked into the rear- or side-view mirror and seen a semi hunkering down on you? Doesn’t it sort of look like a hunchback? And it’s not just the lights/eyes or mirrors/ears. Let’s say that you are on your way back to your vehicle after a long day of shopping at a crowded mall. Sure enough, there are 4 cars in a row, all the same make, model, and color as yours. (My mom is right that certain makes and models travel together: you see a rookery of T-Birds soaring down the highway, a herd of Impalas grazing at the light, a murder of Maseratis flying around the race track, and even a shrewdness of Civics lounging in the parking lot.) Yet, even without looking at the license plate, you can somehow identify your car. Why? It’s because cars have personalities. There is something unique and utterly indescribable that allows you to identify your car from all the others sitting next to it. That is anthropomorphization at its finest.

Like cars, computers, too, have their own personalities. Many times I feel that like me, my computer has not yet had enough caffeine when I start it up. It runs sluggish and angrily…especially on Monday mornings. My computer at home doesn’t like it when I “wake it” from “sleep mode” (I have a Mac, and even the indicator is anthropomorphized: there is a light on the front that, when in sleep mode, glows brighter and dimmer, mimicking the deep, steady breathing of a sleeping person. I thank God every night that my computer doesn’t have a deviated septum). We often complain that our computers are acting up, much like we do about our children. After all, isn’t a computer akin to a child?

The other day, a colleague was having problems with her computer. I overheard the tech at her desk, and it was rather embarrassing. I felt as though I was intruding on something intimate, private; as if I’d walked into a gynecological or prostate exam. I think I may have even blushed. His questions were very clinical: “Has your computer been acting up?”, “Has it been running slowly or sluggishly?”, “Have you noticed any weird emails lately?”, “Have you noticed any attachments that shouldn’t be there?”, “Has it been spitting out incomprehensible code lately?”, “Hmmm, it sounds like it might have a virus.” I was wondering if he was going to pull out a syringe and inject it with some antibiotic. There you go little computer, you’re all better…here’s a lollypop.

It makes sense that we try to humanize things. We are human after all, and it’s the only lens we have to view the world. It is always easier to comprehend things when we relate it to something we know, and many times we do this unconsciously (it’s quite intentional that most ads for watches show the time as 10:10—a smile—and rarely 8:20, a frown). Name your car, pet and caress your computer as you fire it up in the morning so it won’t be persnickety, but don’t ever forget that it’s not really a person. If we continued to see the moon as Artemis riding a silver chariot across the night sky and moonlight as her silver arrows raining down on us, then we never would have landed there in 1969. As science answers more and more questions, will we anthropomorphize less, or will we always see a human being in every inanimate object we use?

Today I felt more like a drone than ever before.

Every morning as I traverse the platform at L’Enfant Plaza heading for the exit, there is always a mad rush around me: some heading to the train behind me and some to the trains below. I stay close to the right hand side and try desperately not to get run over or make eye contact.

In my usual fashion, I walked across the platform to the turnstile where I touched my electronic card to the reader. Once I crossed through the gate, I rounded the corner and queued up with the others at the escalator. This is unusual as there isn’t usually a line to get out of the station. I discovered that 1 of the escalators was turned off and the other was going down. That left only 1 for our ascension.

Ascension, that is a curious word, is it not? The word brings to mind Jesus and Ascension Day. For those not of the Christian persuasion, after Jesus died on the cross, he ascended to Heaven to take his rightful place next to God. For those more interested in science fiction, in Stargate SG-1 to ascend is to transcend death and become pure energy, living with the Ancients and muddling in other people’s affairs. In general, the connotation of the word ascension, like evolution, is that one is going from someplace lower and pedestrian to something higher and enlightened.

So when I think of how the line moved one step at a time it is hard to think of ascension; yet, that is technically what it was. I stood in line, took my step in sync with everyone else, then paused with everyone else, then took a step. I realized that the rhythm of the drones was allied with the movement of the escalator. As a new corrugated metal tread appeared from the depths of concrete that makes the tunnel another would step onto the moving, metal floor that, like an automated machine in a factory would take them up, up, up. As this person rose, the endless stair would create a new tread for the next person to walk upon and the line would step forward in unison.

When it finally came my turn to step onto this machine that turns out people by the thousands, it occurred to me that I have become another working stiff—going to work, coming home, eating, going to bed, only to get up and do it all again tomorrow. I turned to look at the disappearing pit from which I was ascending, and all I could see were even more people taking one step at a time as another person walked onto the ascending conveyor belt on their way to work.