If you truly love G-d, you will hate evil with a burning passion, because He abhors it so

The thunderous affirmation of “Hashem Hu HaElokim” at the final moments of Yom HaKippurim still reverberate in my ears. But there’s something else from the davening that, at least for now, remains lodged in my consciousness as well: the passage of “U’v’chein tein pachdecha,” which we recited repeatedly — 13 times in all — over the course of the Yamim Noraim.

“And so, too, O Hashem our G-d, instill Your awe upon all Your works and Your dread upon all that You have created…. Let them become a single society, to do Your Will wholeheartedly…. Iniquity will close its mouth and all wickedness will evaporate like smoke, when You will remove evil’s domination from the earth.”

Wait. This is from the machzor? The Orthodox one? There must be some mistake. Since when do we care about what takes place in the world at large?

Oh, but we do. Or at least the Torah does.

“Ohavei Hashem sin’u ra, ye lovers of G-d, hate evil.” If you truly love G-d, you will hate evil with a burning passion, because He abhors it so.

The closer one feels to Hashem, Who is pure Goodness, the more does he hate the raw wickedness that is His very antithesis. It is specifically those Awesome Ten Days of “bihiyoso karov” — when He is closer to His Creation than at any other time — that move us to pine for the complete tikkun of His Creation when evil will be finally extirpated from the face of the earth.

“Evil” doesn’t just refer to lashon hara, but also to the horrific cruelty that at this very moment is being visited by various grotesque specimens of humanity upon their captive subjects in a host of unspeakable ways.

One of the most vicious examples is China, which just marked 70 years of rule, during which its dictatorial regimes have perpetrated unmitigated evil, killing some seventy million people. Nor have things gotten better with time: Leading China scholar Jerome Cohen says the current regime, led by Xi Jinping, is the most oppressive one since the Cultural Revolution.

Who is Xi? Here’s one anecdote: A few months ago, a man named Wang Meiyu held up a sign calling on Xi to step down and allow for free elections. Wang was tortured to death to the point that his wife, mother of their two young children, could not recognize the body.

Various Republican senators responded to the Chinese Communist anniversary in the spirit of “v’chol harishah kulah k’ashan tichleh.” Arkansas senator Tom Cotton, for example, declared that from “the Great Leap Forward to the Cultural Revolution to the camps in Xinjiang today, it has been a ghoulish 70 years of Chinese Communist Party control.” Missouri senator Josh Hawley echoed his words, stating that “seventy years ago, the Chinese Community Party seized power from the Chinese people. Since then, its ruthless rule has resulted in the deaths of millions of its own citizens.”

The leader of their party begged to differ. He tweeted, “Congratulations to President Xi and the Chinese people on the 70th Anniversary of the People’s Republic of China!”

Liu Xiaobo was the leading democracy campaigner in China, and a political prisoner, for which he was awarded, in absentia, the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize. Two years ago, he finally succumbed to the tortures inflicted on him, as Red Guards surrounded his deathbed.

On that very day, the American president said of Xi: “He’s a friend of mine. I have great respect for him. We’ve gotten to know each other very well. A great leader. He’s a very talented man. I think he’s a very good man. He loves China, I can tell you. He wants to do what’s right for China.”

No.

North Korea is the place on earth closest to a living Gehinnom for the millions trapped there, a nation-sized prison and torture camp — Ronald Reagan’s UN ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick called it a “psychotic state.” The president has said of Kim Jong-un, the North Korean dictator, that “he is very talented. Anybody who takes over a situation like he did at 26 years of age and is able to run it, and run it tough… He loves his country very much. His country does love him. His people, you see the fervor. They have a great fervor.”

No.

This is not a column about “politics.” It is about being a human being who won’t stifle basic feelings of compassion for other human beings and visceral revulsion at evil. It is about being a Jew, one who says “U’v’chein tein pachdecha” and means it, who yearns for the disappearance of evil of every kind.

Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 782. Eytan Kobre may be contacted directly at kobre@mishpacha.com