R' Amichai Gordin
The profession of the greatest wise man of the era of the Chashmona'im, Rabbi Shimon Ben Shatach, was processing cotton. One time, his students came to him with a proposal: "We can buy you a donkey, and then you will not have to drag your feet around when you work with the cotton." And they went to a Yishmaelite and bought a donkey.
"Now you never have to work again," the students told Rabbi Shimon. He asked, "Why is that?" And they explained, "There was a precious stone hanging from the donkey's neck." The rabbi asked, "Did the seller know that he was also giving you a precious stone?" The students replied, "Of course not!"
So Rabbi Shimon said, "Give the stone back. I bought a donkey, I did not buy a jewel." They returned the stone to the Yishmaelite, who declared, "Blessed is the G-d of Shimon Ben Shatach."
The students wanted to understand what had happened. "Didn't you teach us that there is no obligation to return a lost object to a Gentile?" And Rabbi Shimon scolded them for the question. "Do you think that Rabbi Shimon Ben Shatach is barbaric? I would rather hear the statement, 'Blessed is the G-d of Shimon Ben Shatach,' than to have all the silver and gold in the world!"
[Talmud Yerushalmi, Bava Metzia 2:6; Midrash Devarim, Eikev 3 – with small modifications.]
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One of the giants of the wise men of Yisrael in the previous generation, Rabbi Meir Simcha of Dvinsk, discusses in his book Meshech Chochma the serious nature of the murder of a Gentile. Before the Torah was given, the punishment for murder was death. "If one spills the blood of a man, by man will his blood be spilled" [Bereishit 9:6]. After the Torah was given the strict prohibition of killing a non-Jew remained but from that time the punishment for killing a Gentile was taken out of the hands of man and is punishable by G-d alone. Why is this so?
Rabbi Meir Simcha discusses the reason for this which appears in the Mechilta, and then he proposes a remarkable explanation of his own:
"In addition to the sin of murder, a Jew who kills a Ben Noach has done another serious sin, that of desecrating the name of G-d. In the Talmud Yerushalmi, we are told the wondrous story of Shimon Ben Shatach – he preferred to hear a blessing for the G-d of the Jews than to obtain all the material wealth of the world. If this is true of monetary laws, it is certainly true for murdering a person's body, which entails a great measure of desecrating His name.
"Repentance does not bring forgiveness for desecrating G-d's name, nor does Yom Kippur and even suffering. Only death can absolve a person for this sin. 'This sin will be forgiven only after you die' [Yeshayahu 22:14]. Thus, one who murders a non-Jew is punished by death for desecrating G-d's name. One who kills a Gentile is liable for a punishment of death for desecrating the name, how can he be forgiven for the serious sin of murder by the same death penalty? And so his punishment is a matter to be settled in heaven..."
[Meshech Chochma 21:14, with minor changes.]
One who murders a Jew, heaven forbid, is given a punishment of death. The sin of one who murders a non-Jew is much greater, and his death will not be sufficient to absolve him of the desecration of G-d's name and also of taking the life of a human being.
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The murderous struggle against the Gentiles who surround us ("in every generation, they stand over us to destroy us" – Haggada), cannot make us forget our role – to be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation, for us and for the entire world. "My house will be called a house of prayer for all the nations" [Yeshayahu 56:7].
The Holy One, Blessed be He, does not want to destroy all the nations that surround us. "How can I not show mercy for the great city Ninveh, which has in it more than 120,000 people?" [Yonah 4:11]. He wants us to be a model society which advances the mending of the world in the Kingdom of Shadai, and which calls out to the whole world to know that "the G-d of Yisrael is King, and His kingdom rules everything."
Our job is to raise the people of the world to the moral level of our Torah and not to descend into the depths of their immorality. We will not copy the barbarism of the nations that surround us, including their cruelty and evil, rather we will make sure that they learn from us what light, honesty, and morality are.
It is very wrong to think that it would have been best if the world society of non-Jews had not been created. World society has a central role to play in the universe that was created by the Holy One, Blessed be He. In our role as the "heart of all the nations," must lead the world forward, on a track that rises up to the House of G-d.
Sanctification of the holy name does not depend only on what the Jews think about our holy Torah, it also depends on what the other nations say about us – about us and about our G-d.
