By Emily Mayer

address to a convention of Jewish youth representatives in Antwerp in 1932, "It may be characteristic of Zion that it cannot be built with 'every possible means,' but only bemishpat (Isa. 1:27), only 'with justice.'"*** He continues to remark that the Jewish community cannot allow Israel to be built according to unjust means, because doing so will inevitably lead to an unjust society.

I think that these two themes, emancipating ourselves and the morals involved building communities, go hand-in-hand. If freeing ourselves means not only freeing ourselves physically, but also emancipating our minds from the destructive cultural forces that inevitably affect us, we must also make sure not to appropriate the bad methods of these forces in an effort to save ourselves. Take our education for example. One thing that I know I bring up a lot in the classic Habo conversation of education vs. indoctrination is that our kids are already brainwashed in a lot of ways by society. However, we must not rely on this argument as a justification for our own brainwashing, but make sure that we are providing chanichim with truly liberatory education, education which is freeing not only in its content, but in its method as well. That means asking them questions, allowing them choice, valuing their opinions, etc. I think this concept of ensuring the liberatory nature of our method is every bit as important as "fighting the man" itself, in relation to educating our chanichim, engaging with our home communities, and (re)building the state of Israel.

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