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How Postmodern Ideologies Twist Biblical Morality to Redefine Evil

(Jerusalem Post) Gerald M. Steinberg - The contrast between good and evil and between justice and injustice are fundamental themes throughout the Hebrew Bible as well as in the wider Western canon. However, in the postmodern 21st century, this fundamental moral framework has been abandoned and rejected, as reflected in the cliche: "One man's (or woman's) terrorist is another's freedom fighter." Those who, in past centuries, would have been tried, jailed, and cast out of society as evildoers - such as murderers and rapists - are now relieved of responsibility for their actions and recast as victims of circumstances or society, and thus not responsible for their deeds. In the realms of war and peace, the distinction between aggressors (bad) and defenders (good) has been replaced with an ideological litmus test that instead divides the world between ostensible "colonizers" (bad) and victims of colonization, who are automatically good. Regardless of the massive destruction and atrocities that the so-called victims commit, they are treated like children, and cannot be held morally accountable for their actions. In this false morality and reversal of good and evil, the Jewish people and Israel are absurdly relegated to the category of Western colonizers, and Palestinian Arabs are the unquestioned victims who cannot be held accountable for their actions. When four presidents of prominent universities recently told a U.S. congressional committee that categorizing the mob attacks and intimidation targeting Jews as acts of hatred and antisemitism "depended on the context," they were repeating the postmodern blindness to the essential difference between good and evil and between justice and injustice. These distinctions are essential to a moral human society. The writer is founder and president of NGO Monitor and professor emeritus of politics at Bar-Ilan University.
2024-10-22 00:00:00
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