Question & Answer With My Readers - My Four Year-Old Daughter Asks
A Simple Jew's four year-old daughter asks:
Why didn't Hashem make everyone Jewish?
My readers answer sensitively with the knowledge that she will repeat this answer to our non-Jewish neighbors:
10 Comments:
Hashem has different and unique roles for everyone to play in His creation (our world is like a big play). Some roles are better done by Jews, and some are done better by non Jews. It's important to know your role and play it well!
Can I answer a question with a question? ...Why didn't Hashem make everyone astronauts?
(And wouldn't it be a dull world if everyone and everything was the same?)
Hello, ASJ's 4-year old daughter!
(sorry i don't know your name)
Hashem created the whole world. He created many things. He created the sun, the moon and the stars. Ask Abba to take you outside at night to count the stars. Hashem also created 70 nations. Italians are people from Italy, Africans are people from Africa, these are the non-Jewish people. Hashem created the Jewish nation and that is why we are called Jews.
(Abba, you can continue from here)
Our first fathers and mothers worked very hard long ago to come close to HaShem, so HaShem made us His special people to fix the world. Everyone else can work with us in their own best ways to finish this job.
HaShem created the goyim to eat all the dirty animals so they wouldn't over-run the earth! Just like spiders!
No wait, that's what I was told when I was four. Never mind.
Actually the Midrash says that if they had been worthy, Hashem would have given the Torah to the generation of Noach. And the ARI zal further explains that those souls (i.e. all humanity) were later reincarnated as Bnei Yisrael in Mitzrayim, while Noach was reincarnated as Moshe Rabbenu. So in a sense, Hashem originally did create everyone as Jews.
Now it is the task of the Jewish people to rectify their original failure by living according to Toras Moshe and serving as a "light unto the nations" -- that is, by being a moral and spiritual example that will inspire others to return to Hashem of their own free choice.
BTW compliments on the wonderful picture of your little daughter, ASJ. May you and your wife have much nachas from her and all of your children, present and future!
Thank you all for your feedback!
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I was doing research at the library today and came across this Q & A to Rebbe Pinchas of Koretz:
Why Did G-d Create Non-Jews?
Rabbi Pinchas of Koretz was asked, "Why did G-d create the non-Jewish nations who are so brazen in their sinfulness?"
He replied, "Just as he created darkness to make you appreciate light, so did He create non-Jews to demonstrate the greater virtue of the Jewish people."
(Imrei Pinchas, Inyanim Shonim 120)
*****
However, for your sweet little girl, I wouldn't put it in such harsh terms. I would probably explain that Hashem made lots of things with different colors and shapes: flowers, dogs, cats, etc, and He made different kinds of people, too. Jews are one of the many different groups of people. In all the groups, there are good people and bad people, but in the Jewish group, people try extra hard to be good, and that makes Hashem happy.
Hashem chose the Jews because we chose Him. Every one can volunteer for the job of being a jew - even non-jews, if they so choose, can volunteer, by becoming a Jew. A Jew means a person who is willing to be Hashem's representative. In class, at times, the teacher will say "Who wants to help me?" and one little girl will say "i do" and that little girl then becomes the teacher's helper for the year. When Hashem asked "which people want to help the world understand that I created the world", the Jews said "we want to do that" and that is why we are Jews. But any non-Jew can join us, by also volunteering to do this job
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