The Anomalous Ending of Psalm 51 and the Meaning of Repentance

On the Jewish calendar, the period from the first day of Rosh Hashanah through Yom Kippur is known as the Ten Days of Repentance, traditionally a time of introspection and heightened religious devotion. Judith Bleich examines one of the oldest and most foundational Jewish texts on the subject of repentance, or t’shuvah: Psalm 51. She looks specifically at the final two verses: “Do good in Your favor unto Zion, build the walls of Jerusalem. Then You will desire the sacrifices of righteousness, burnt-offering and whole-offering; then will bullocks go up upon Your altar.”

Many non-traditional scholars find these final remarks a puzzling and even incongruous conclusion. They underscore the somewhat contradictory references to sacrifices and claim that the closing comments are anticlimactic following as they do a verse extolling “a heart broken and humbled.”

Perhaps . . . one may offer an alternative resolution to the question of the choice of these sentences as the finale of the psalm. . . . There is [a] teaching regarding repentance emphasized by Maimonides: “All the prophets, all of them, commanded regarding t’shuvah, and Israel will only be redeemed by t’shuvah. And the Torah has promised that ultimately Israel will repent at the end of the exile and immediately they will be redeemed. When each of the individuals who collectively constitute [the Jewish people] will engage in introspection and be spurred to wholehearted repentance, society will be transformed and we will merit redemption.”

In this psalm, King David reinforces the various lessons of t’shuvah and the manner in which we should engage in the repentance process with contrition, sincerity, and humbled hearts. Then, he concludes, will the final teaching of t’shuvah also become a manifest reality: “Do good in Your favor unto Zion, build the walls of Jerusalem.”

Read more at Tradition

More about: Judaism, Psalms, Repentance

American Middle East Policy Should Focus Less on Stability and More on Weakening Enemies

Feb. 10 2025

To Elliott Abrams, Donald Trump’s plan to remove the entire population of Gaza while the Strip is rebuilt is “unworkable,” at least “as a concrete proposal.” But it is welcome insofar as “its sheer iconoclasm might lead to a healthy rethinking of U.S. strategy and perhaps of Arab and Israeli policies as well.” The U.S., writes Abrams, must not only move beyond the failed approach to Gaza, but also must reject other assumptions that have failed time and again. One is the commitment to an illusory stability:

For two decades, what American policymakers have called “stability” has meant the preservation of the situation in which Gaza was entirely under Hamas control, Hizballah dominated Lebanon, and Iran’s nuclear program advanced. A better term for that situation would have been “erosion,” as U.S. influence steadily slipped away and Washington’s allies became less secure. Now, the United States has a chance to stop that process and aim instead for “reinforcement”: bolstering its interests and allies and actively weakening its adversaries. The result would be a region where threats diminish and U.S. alliances grow stronger.

Such an approach must be applied above all to the greatest threat in today’s Middle East, that of a nuclear Iran:

Trump clearly remains open to the possibility (however small) that an aging [Iranian supreme leader Ali] Khamenei, after witnessing the collapse of [his regional proxies], mulling the possibility of brutal economic sanctions, and being fully aware of the restiveness of his own population, would accept an agreement that stops the nuclear-weapons program and halts payments and arms shipments to Iran’s proxies. But Trump should be equally aware of the trap Khamenei might be setting for him: a phony new negotiation meant to ensnare Washington in talks for years, with Tehran’s negotiators leading Trump on with the mirage of a successful deal and a Nobel Peace Prize at the end of the road while the Iranian nuclear-weapons program grows in the shadows.

Read more at Foreign Affairs

More about: Iran, Middle East, U.S. Foreign policy