Peloni: Fascinating!
By Victor Sharpe
A hareidi man blowing a Shofar. Photo by Lilach Daniel – Flickr: [1], CC BY 2.0, Wikipedia
Here are two words that sound similar to the human ear but whose meanings are a universe apart.
Tekiah is the Hebrew word uttered in the synagogue to usher in the sound of the shofar – the ram’s horn – during the Jewish festival of Rosh Hashanah: the Jewish New Year.
Tekiah emphasizes constancy and steadfastness; concepts which are so fundamental in Jewish faith and life as enshrined in the Torah (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible) and indeed throughout the entire Hebrew Bible. They help families raise children who thus grow up to enrich their lives and the lives of others, generation after generation.
Tekiah also affirms the belief in the One and Only God besides whom there is none other, and His coronation as King of the Universe. In Judaism, God is all-powerful. God is the Creator. God is the Sustainer. God is the Supervisor. In short, God is King of the Universe.
But in Jewish tradition, a king is first and foremost a servant of the people. He is the very negation of the mortal king who so often and so readily may become a tyrant and enslaves the people.
The One and Only God is concerned that the people live in happiness and harmony. As the great Jewish rabbi and philosopher, Maimonides, wrote in his Laws of Kings; 2:6:
“His decrees and laws are only for the good of the people, not for himself.”
As Maimonides also wrote, “It isn’t enough that God is MY King alone. If ALL humanity doesn’t recognize God as King, then there is something lacking in my own relationship with God. Part of my love for the Almighty is to help guide all people to an appreciation of Him. Of course, this is largely an expression of my deep caring for others. But it also affects my own sense of God’s all-encompassing Kingship.”
Tekiah reminds us, therefore, of His concern that we acknowledge the commandments are for the good of mankind and that all people shall live in true peace and harmony. It awakens believers from the trap of spiritual slumber and complacency that leads us to indifference in the needs of humanity and reminds us to care for each and every human being individually and personally.
Now compare the Hebrew word Tekiah and its meaning to the Arabic word Taqiyya and its meaning.
Taqiyya means quite literally the following: “Concealment, precaution, guarding.” It is a device sanctioned in the Koran and other Islamic writings to promote the cause of Islam. It specifically includes injunctions to the followers of Islam to practice lying and deceit towards the non-Muslim; those whom Muslims impudently call “infidels.”
Such deception is the negation of love of fellow human beings or of the need to care for all of humanity. In other words, the injunctions found in Judaism and Christianity. Such unholy Islamic stratagems include lying under oath or uttering the falsehood that Islam means peace but hiding its true meaning, which is submission – not to the will of the people as in a democracy – but only to the will of Allah.
A Muslim is even permitted to deny or denounce his faith if, in so doing, he protects or furthers the interests of Islam, so long as he remains faithful to Islam in his heart. That Muslim children in generation after generation are so shamefully taught to deceive themselves and others is the sure and certain way to confound any hope of ever enriching their lives.
Thus, the concept of Taqiyya has been used by Muslims since the 7th century to confuse, confound and divide those they perceive to be their enemy, specially including those who refuse to convert to Islam: a sure and horrific sentence of enslavement of women and death to adult males.
Here then is the unbridgeable gulf between the meanings of Tekiah and Taqiyyah. The one means an affirmation of goodness, the other plumbs the depth of wickedness.
Everyone should be taking notes here.