• 10 -

2. Our Eternal Aspiration — An Independent Land.

Every race, distinct in its unique characteristics, aspires to be a "nation," that is to say, to create for itself a unique economic, political, and spiritual environment, in which every individual is born from its "environment" and in doing so is suited to its "people." Such an environment the race can create only in its own land, in a place where it is the master; therefore, every race aspires to become a kingdom.

One race strives for this with all its might, because it has the necessary stubbornness for it. — And another race — feebly, because it lacks the power of resistance, but in the integrity of its nature it also wants this, because only in its own state is it comfortable, but otherwise it is "uncomfortable." — "Uncomfortable" perhaps not only for itself, but also for its neighbors, the masters of the land.

The Jews serve as a striking example of this law, that every "race" always seeks to dwell in an environment that it itself has created, in accordance with its spiritual character. Our history begins thousands of years ago, with our people seeking a "Land" for its possession. And now again we seek a "Land," and again that very same land.

But not only in this "Zionism," from the generation of the desert to the pioneers of our time, is our eternal aspiration proven: to live in a "Land" for ourselves. When one observes well, one sees that same aspiration in all the main manifestations of our history in exile: in our economic life, in our attitude towards religious tradition, and even in the manner of our daily lives, in this community and that.

The Jew preserved his national existence in exile by using everything around him as a means for his isolation: general economic isolation by choosing for himself an economic sphere in which there were not many "gentiles"; a double isolation by secluding himself from any criticism regarding tradition, and within the tradition itself he exaggerates the isolating elements.

A threefold isolation — by means of the ghetto. This isolation cost him the price of all expansiveness, all the soaring breadth of social and individual life. But he accepted this price calmly and willingly.