I remember once sitting next to a non-Jewish woman on an airplane on the way to Louisville, Kentucky. She asked me why I was visiting her city. I told her I was going to speak to the Jewish community there.
As the conversation continued—on the subject of Jews—it became apparent to me this woman thought there were far more Jews in Kentucky than there actually were. I told her (at that time) there were 280 million Americans, and then asked her, “How many of them do you think are Jews?”
She thought for a moment, and responded, “About fifty million.”
When I told her there were about six million Jews in America, she was clearly startled. She pondered this, and then said, “I guess they must all live in Kentucky.” As of this writing, there are about fourteen million Jews in a world population of about seven and a half billion. That means that about .0018 percent, or fewer than two out of every thousand people in the world, are Jews. But few people would guess this—because the influence of the Jews has always been so great. And the reason for that influence is this Torah, its G-d, its Ten Commandments, and its Exodus story. In short, the stories and values of the Book of Exodus have transformed the world.
