Page 139 of Megillat Esther depicts a war taking place. Text in the center of the page states, "And the remainder of the Judeans which were in the states of the king assembled and stood for their lives. On the thirteenth day of Adar they killed those that hated them: 75,000 people. And on the fourteenth, they made a day of feast and happiness." There is no mention of feeling any remorse for taking thousands of human lives. It never says, "And the murderous Judeans wept for the sake of the sin they had committed," or anything like that.
I know that generally speaking, one does not mourn those he has killed himself, but there were so MANY people that I'm sure not every single ONE of them hated the Jews. There must have been some innocent people killed, too. How does that make the Jews any better than the Nazis killing people who were "unlike" themselves? Will it take us all having the same skin color due to generations upon generations of multicultural babies to realize that people are people and we should all respect and love each other?
In middle school my Judaica teacher said, "love your neighbor as yourself." It's like the golden rule, "do unto others as you would have others do unto you." I so do not understand war over silly personal issues. If everyone killed everyone who did not like them, humans would be extinct.
Whatever happened to this wonderful method of thinking? It's so positive. We have coexist stickers, Threadless shirts "give peas a chance," all this "let's treat the environment better" stuff. Nothing wrong with that! BUT, why can't we start with, let's try not to kill each other over trifles? I just don't find it necessary.
Another one here: Very positive message.
The movie Love Actually is a fantastic illustration of little social successes in everyday life. What I mean by "social successes" is people exchanging positive energy. There's a scene of families reuniting in an airport. Hugging, kissing, smiling, talking... if we can kidnap little kids and teach them to be killing machines, why not teach them to be... um... "loving machines" isn't REALLY the term I want to use. Happy? Kids are happy. Affectionate? Do you know what I'm getting at? The anti-killing. The pro-coexisting, but more than "coexisting." More like, let's all be friends. I know it's idealistic and that EVERYONE can't be friends, but I also know that I've made a lot of friends in strange ways that would be considered "abnormal."
Here's a story:
I was going to eat dinner. I was alone; figured I'd find someone I knew at Blackhawk. I found a group of friends and stopped with my tray full of food to say hi. Everyone was finishing ice cream cones, so I said goodbye and headed towards a guy who I THOUGHT was someone I knew. He sat plainly in view of the table I'd just walked away from. As I approached the table for a closer look, I realize it was a stranger. I said, "Hi, um... I thought you were someone else, but... mind if I sit here anyway?" He was also alone and said okay. Now we're buds! We had a nice time. Yes, it's unconventional; but now we eat together all the time! We wave and smile at each other in passing. In the long run, my little world is ultimately happier.
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