A recent New York Times column by Bret Stephens featured a speech he gave upon receiving an honorary doctorate from Yeshiva University. Although he told the audience he’d “like to think that [his] rabbinic forebears from Vilna are smiling on this occasion” I’m somewhat dubious that they’d be moved by an honorary degree from any institution.

The approbation of his litvishe ancestors notwithstanding it’s for the most part a fabulous talk with important points for Americans to ponder at this moment of our history. And although he was talking about America and the larger world when refracted through a Jewish lens many of the issues he raised might just as well be directed at us.

Stephens imagines what someone living a hundred years from now and looking back at the 21st century might name as the innovations that defined it in economic terms. He suggests three candidates as of this moment.

The first is fracking which has taken us in the course of a decade from predictions of an end to the world’s oil supply and of America being a marginal energy producer to an “era of energy superabundance in which America is again the global leader.” The second is that of mobile apps which are now “a ubiquitous feature of our lives… and will revolutionize everything from the way we get pizzas to medical diagnoses.” And lastly there is the new frontier of gene therapies which have “opened the prospect that many cancers may be manageable or curable after all.”

He then observes that all three of these revolutionary ideas have largely “had their genesis in the USA. Not in Russia or Japan the former countries of the future. Not in China the current one. Not in Brazil the perpetual one. They happened in America. And the interesting question is: Why?”

To answer that question he suggests asking ourselves the following four basic questions that can help explain what makes a country great: How do we treat foreigners? What is our attitude toward independent thinking? What is our attitude toward failure? What is our attitude toward global leadership?

On the first query Stephens doesn’t deny that there are liabilities to welcoming immigrants into our society but asks whether we recognize the far greater benefits citing some important statistics: 40% of all Fortune 500 companies were founded by immigrants or their children; new Americans start businesses at about twice the rate of native-born ones; without immigrants we would have had no population growth since 1970 resulting in the kind of demographic crisis experienced by Japan; 83% of the 2016 Intel Science Talent competition winners were children of immigrants.

And one more for those concerned that all Mexicans are criminals: The incarceration rate of illegal immigrants is nearly half that of American citizens. The germane inquiry he says is whether “we see newcomers as an opportunity for us to grow” and have “abiding faith in our founding creed” of having been “created equal.”

Regarding independent thinking he argues that the United States has “always been a land of invention — technical political and social — because it has given wide latitude to indelicate statements” and that we have “thrived because we have a cultural disposition in favor of the gadfly the contrarian the upstart…. It is why we’ve been able to maintain an international edge in the ‘Think Different category.’ ”

AS FOR OUR ATTITUDE TOWARD FAILURE Mr. Stephens brings a crucial insight of Bernard Lewis the dean of Middle East scholars on why that region is so rife with failure. Lewis wrote that when things go wrong people can ask one of two questions: “What did we do wrong?” or “Who did this to us?” The first leads to rethinking and doing better the second to paranoia and entrenchment.

Finally he notes this year marks the 70th anniversary of the Truman Doctrine. Under it that president rescued a blockaded West Berlin came to the defense of an embattled South Korea and recognized a fledgling Israel. It is a vision under which our interests are defined by our values rather than — like every empire that has disappeared — vice versa.

In the years since Truman promised that “America would come to the economic and military aid of embattled nations ” he says “Americans have broadly understood that great nations… lead by example: by inspiring rather than coercing loyalty; by a decent respect for the opinions of mankind; by steadfastness of purpose and evenness of temperament….” And indeed America has since then had 70 years of unparalleled prosperity and no world wars.

We know that Hashem runs the world inclusive of the fates of nations. But in deciding that He takes into account two things that are often intertwined: their moral caliber and how they treat His chosen people. And that’s where Stephens’s incisive questions come in since as he makes clear they are not about specific policies “over which honorable people can disagree.” They are primarily about “habits of mind and virtues of character: about hospitality and openness; intellectual independence and tolerance; forgiveness and responsibility; magnanimity courage and fair play.”

But we too are a nation — a very special eternal one. And these questions are ones we ought to give thought to as well albeit in each case with a uniquely Jewish twist.

How do we treat foreigners? Not only strange-speaking immigrants can be foreigners but also the baal teshuvah the ger the divorcée the older single even just the kid who has no yichus or big money to recommend him in school and anyone who isn’t totally “with it” in contemporary frum terms.

What is our attitude toward independent thinking? For us who proudly believe in hisbatlus to emes treasuring independent thinking connotes bending our heads to the chachmei haTorah who are the only people who have actually spent a lifetime working toward independence from the biases of body and ego. It also means — to turn on its head the old saw about the Reform movement being the American left but with holidays — being willing to stake out positions on issues of the day that don’t make us seem like the American right but with beanies and side curls.

What is our attitude toward failure? Per Stephens’s definition as the ability to acknowledge failure rather than look for scapegoats this means that as we go about proclaiming Mi k’amcha Yisrael we also bend an ear to hear what others fear about us and consider whether there’s perhaps a bit of truth to it.

That also brings us to the last question: What is our attitude toward global leadership? America may have somehow ascended to the position of global leader but we were actually created for that role. And on that score we ought to wonder as Ed Koch used to say how’re we doin’? Better yet do we even think of ourselves in those terms or do we simply block out the rest of the world? When there is effectively no larger world in your worldview that makes it rather difficult to be its leader.

Those are all questions that I’d like to think Mr. Stephens’ Vilna forebears would approve of.

Originally featured in Mishpacha Issue 690. Eytan Kobre may be contacted directly at kobre@mishpacha.com