Bob Schwartz

“Remember the blood of the innocent cries forever. Should that blood stop to cry, humanity would cease to be.”
—Abraham Joshua Heschel

Abraham Joshua Heschel was a great Jewish thinker, writer and prophet of the twentieth century. I have included him in over 30 posts, far more than any other figure. Here is one example.

Heschel was one of the earliest religionists to oppose the Vietnam War. As a friend and colleague of Martin Luther King Jr. in the civil rights movement, he influenced King to publicly come out against the war.

Benjamin Sax talks about the price Heschel paid:

“When he came out against the Vietnam War for example, there were a lot of Jewish presses and a lot of Jewish leadership that spoke out against him. There was a lot of criticism about his leadership, about his point of view – he was considered naive. Worse he was considered theologically naive. That what he was doing was undermining the safety of his own people and undermining the safety of our country. And that aspiring to these universal, patriotic values was something that at least many in the Jewish community wanted to put out there even if they were uncomfortable with the reasons why we were in Vietnam. And so, it also put his reputation at risk.”

Heschel wrote about the war:

“The blood we shed in Vietnam makes a mockery of all our proclamations, dedications, celebrations. Has our conscience become a fossil, is all, mercy gone? If mercy, the mother of humility, is still alive as a demand, how can we say yes to our bringing agony to that tormented country? We are here because our own integrity as human beings is decaying in the agony and merciless killing done in our name. In a free society, some are guilty and all are responsible. We are here to call upon the governments of the United States as well as North Vietnam to stand still and to consider that no victory is worth the price of terror, which all parties commit in Vietnam, North and South. Remember the blood of the innocent cries forever. Should that blood stop to cry, humanity would cease to be.”

Heschel died in 1972. It would be beyond presumptuous—criminal and sinful—to claim to know what he would be saying about the current Israeli war in Gaza. All we can know is that he urged flawed human beings to rise above self to do better and be better, which is what he believed God needs us to do.