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To: Zionist Conspirator
When, in the only government G-d has ever established on this earth, was there ever "separation of church(?) and state?"...the historical books that tell of Israel at her glory when the Holy Temple stood and she was ruled by G-d's anointed king? Where was the "separation of church(?) and state" while all this was going on???

The modern notion of "separation of Church and State" is indeed nonsense, and the sooner we drop this idiotic notion that there must *never* be any established religion, we'll be better off. Separation has led to an acrimonious divorce.

As far as the Davidic kingdom goes, it was less the culmination of God's great plan for the Hebrews, than a concession to their stubborness (cf. 1 Samuel 8)--

8:7. And the Lord said to Samuel: Hearken to the voice of the people in all that they say to thee. For they have not rejected thee, but me, that I should not reign over them.

8:18. And you shall cry out in that day from the face of the king, whom you have chosen to yourselves: and the Lord will not hear you in that day, because you desired unto yourselves a king.

20 posted on 08/22/2003 11:14:33 AM PDT by Claud
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To: Claud
Actually, it is a mitzvah of the Torah (in this week's portion, I believe) that `Am Yisra'el was to choose a king (som tasim `aleykha melekh) so that he could 1) exterminate the `Amaleqites and 2) build the Temple. Samuel scolded not the act of choosing a king in and of itself, but the flawed motivation of the Israelites which was not so much to obey the mitzvah as to "be like all the other nations round about."

It is a great tragedy that all the ideas that were originally Jewish have come to be perceived as non-Jewish and even anti-Jewish ideas (Theocracy, holy war, etc.). I don't know how long it will take for Jews to re-learn their own heritage after attacking it in others for so long. I suppose when they stop using Scottish names and actually go back to using Hebrew names like Yedidyahu.

The modern secular state is a recent phenomenon. In ancient times religion was neither private nor purely interior but formed the public life of the nation (though most of these religions were false). Today in the modern secular state we have Pat Buchanan putting his loyalty to fellow northwest-European-descended Protestants ahead of his (non-existent) loyalty to his indigenous Mexican co-religionists. This is a thoroughy modern notion and whether Buchanan's loyalty is motivated by race or secular state citizenship he is most certainly not being an orthodox Catholic.

21 posted on 08/22/2003 12:02:48 PM PDT by Zionist Conspirator (G-d's laws or NONE!!!)
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To: Claud
I must correct myself. The commandment som tasim `aleykha melekh does not occur in this week's parashah (Re'eh) but in next week's (Shofetim). My apologies.
23 posted on 08/22/2003 12:07:48 PM PDT by Zionist Conspirator (G-d's laws or NONE!!!)
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To: Claud
One more thing: the fusion of state and religion is not as problematic in Judaism as it is in chr*stianity, whose scriptures authorize no such thing (the birth of the "chr*stian state" was partly based on pragmatism and partly on the Jewish example, but there is no authorization or description of chr*stian theocracy in the new testament).
24 posted on 08/22/2003 2:33:25 PM PDT by Zionist Conspirator (G-d's laws or NONE!!!)
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