Orde Wingate

To the Editors:

I read with interest the article by Michael B. Oren on Orde Wingate (“Orde Wingate: Friend Under Fire,” Azure 10, Winter 2001). I would, however, like to point out two errors in his article.

First, Oren repeats the tale of Wingate greeting guests in the nude. In point of fact, I went to his hut in Ein Harod every day to receive a summary of his daily talk (in English, obviously). Before he permitted anyone to enter his room, he would cover himself with a towel.

Second, Oren writes that I was in the Palmah. At the time, I was in fact part of the standing forces of the Hagana. I did, however, have a hand in determining the name “Palmah”: In 1940 we offered two proposals to Ya’akov Dori—pelugot sa’ar (“Assault Brigades”) and pelugot mahatz (“Shock Brigades”)—as an appellation for the new Hagana units that were to be established. Dori chose the term pelugot mahatz, which he abbreviated as Palmah.

Avraham Akavia
Haifa

 

Michael B. Oren claims that the origin of the IDF battle cry of aharai (“after me”) lies with the military command standard set by Orde Wingate. That may very well be the case.

Nevertheless, as Oren recounts, Wingate himself lectured his soldiers from a Bible he always carried with him prior to setting out on raids, in order to raise morale, and remind them that they were fighting in places where Jews had fought in the past.

That being so, he himself probably was aware of the verse located in I Samuel 14:12. There, Jonathan, son of Saul, leading a small commando raid against the Philistines near Michmas, instructs his weapon-bearer: “Arise after me, for the Eternal has given them unto Israel.” The Hebrew word there is the same: Aharai.

So the IDF came full circle, needing a Christian lover of Zion to recall to the Special Night Squad troops, who, in turn, inspired Moshe Dayan and Yigal Allon, that it was a prince in Israel, companion to the warrior-king David, who set the standard that Jewish commanders lead.

Eve Harow
Efrat

 

With regard to Ze’ev Maghen’s essay, “Imagine: On Love and Lennon” (Azure 7, Spring 1999), it should be stated clearly that the importance of the article does not lie in any major innovations in his arguments; on the contrary, the latter tend to be overstated reformulations of familiar claims, presented as if they were new. Rather, the importance of the essay consists in its addressing the question of preferential love, as opposed to egalitarian love, and in its application of the issue of cultural diversity, as opposed to nihilistic pluralism, to discussions concerning our cultural future. Even though they are not sufficiently cogent, his claims that no intelligent person could allow himself to forgo his own cultural heritage seem to be on the mark. Whoever burns the bridges to his own culture always ends up relying on those of others; without the ability to give, one can only receive, like a beggar without home or family. Such a renunciation is not only foolish, but a kind of spiritual suicide. Maghen is right when he argues that the denial of one’s own culture is not pluralism, even if it comes with a longing for other peoples’ cultures. In pluralism, it is not enough for everyone to receive, but one must also give something of one’s own. Someone who has nothing to give is, at best, a thief or a plagiarist, but in no way is he a pluralist.

Still, I have several major problems with the article, the most severe of which is the degree to which it insults the intelligence of the reader. Whereas the author goes out of his way to promise that he will not do so, he nonetheless manages to insult flagrantly any reader of minimal intelligence. Maghen makes a string of such promises, all the while ignoring the proverb from Ecclesiastes that “it is better not to vow than to vow and not fulfill.” In one instance, he declares that the views of Hare Krishna are legitimate and important. Two pages later comes the promise: “I am not going to advocate that we stay Jewish because Doron’s [Krishna] dispensationalist vision of a new world order… is pure Hindu hallucination….” He immediately follows with the complementary claim that “I am not now and never will be a Jew and a Zionist out of fear, or because I have no choice.” Finally, Maghen declares that he is committed to the idea of preferential love, “regardless of which theology or philosophy is privileged to be used or abused as the paradigm.”

Of course, these promises are false and mutually contradictory. It seems that the author thinks all his readers must be incapable of recalling the assurances he made only a few pages earlier. If he regards the path of Hare Krishna, that of universal love, as legitimate, how can he declare his allegiance to “preferential love”? Conversely, if preferential love is the answer, then the Krishna approach is precisely the Hindu hallucination that he said he would not claim it to be. Similarly, Maghen’s claim that the fulfillment of John Lennon’s dream would mean no less than “the wholesale and irreversible destruction of the dreams, hopes, happinesses, and very reason for living of yourself and every single person you know” also means that the Krishna approach must too be a catastrophic lie, for it too deprives man of the reasons for which life is worth living.

Dov Landau
Petah Tikva