I heard this story twice in recent days. It’s just in time, as daily life in Israel could be mistaken for a crisis. This is how it goes:

Someone was walking home from one of the anti-government protests we’ve lately been having, Israeli flag in hand. Someone else, on the opposite side of the actual street and the political fence, was just arriving for a pro-government rally (they’ve been going under the alias pro- and anti- judicial reform) and realized he had left his flag at home. You see, both sides are convinced that only their point of view protects the nation and that the other side endangers and even attacks it. Also, Israel is a very patriotic country and the days around Yom HaAtzmaut, our Independence Day, are filled with Israel flags everywhere you look.

So, the person who had forgotten his at home asked the flag-bearing person approaching him, who by all measures endangers us all with his political opinions (just as the fellow leaving the protest feels that the approaching one endangers us all), if he could borrow the flag for his protest. As I heard this story, he handed it to his friend with a smile, a hug and a cheerful, “Achi“, my brother!

And this is just part of the beauty of the conundrum of Israel. While one side accuses the other of actions that will lead to a totalitarian halachic (run under Jewish religious law) state, the other fears a totalitarian secular regime that is no more Jewish than the World Soccer League, each fiercely loves the same country and rarely misses an opportunity to wave our flag.

Of course, this works here because, “Kol Yisrael Eravim Zeh BaZeh” (TB Shavuot 39a), the entire Jewish nation are intertwined with one-another. Not only do we talk about being One Family, we are. And like all families quarrel from time to time,  even hate one another at time, the deeper connection always overrides. This is such a fundamental principle that the Maharal (Netivot Olam) uses it as proof of God’s essential unity!

No matter how much any one of us knows, there is always more he doesn’t, can’t. For that very reason, it’s essential to be able to turn to those whose points of view are the farthest from our own in order to learn what’s beyond the boundary of our own knowledge. Not only do we need our “enemy”, we’re totally dependent on him to complete our own wisdom. That kind of interdependence with the total “other”, necessary to fill in our own gaps and just as necessary for him to fill in their gaps, also best describes love, where each partner is eager to give freely of all they are.

We are, indeed, mandated to love our friend as we love ourselves, V’Ahavta l’Reyacha K’mocha (Vayikra 19:18), which Rashi explains is, according to Rabbi Akiva, a major theme of the entire Torah. How much grater a challenge it is, with proportional reward, to love our (within our extended family, Am Yisrael, that is) enemy or, at least the one whose knowledge appears the farthest from our own. In fact, it is only through a loving relationship (acknowledging the validity of that opinion, all the while maintaining one’s own opposite opinion) with our “enemy”, with our opposite number, that we can begin to understand the full truth and reality of anything. We can, and should, embrace this “other” as the necessary extension to our own vision.

After all, that is the technique we’ve employed for the thousands of years of Talmudic reasoning. Likewise the fundamental dialectic of our deepest spiritual system where both Chesed and Gevura are both necessary in equal measure to derive Tikferet (Netzach + Hod > Yesod), where it takes a man and a woman to create a new life (and the very act of creating that new life is referred to as Dea, meaning to know!).
Of course I’m not saying that Love is the enemy of Strength, or that men an women are enemies, but that we must bless (which means gratitude to The Creator) that the one who is farthest from ourselves (along these types of parameters) is as much a part of the world as we are. Likewise, we’re enjoined to offer a prayer for the bad that we receive exactly as we offer a prayer for the good. (Mishna Berachot 9:5). Reconciling these extremes can, at times, require super-human strength as well as super-human belief, but attempting and, hopefully, approaching that ideal is, nevertheless a required step on becoming fully human.

And so, by sharing the same beloved flag, the symbol of the mutually beloved nation, although each person had a radically different idea of that nation from the other, is part of the great beauty of Am Yisrael and  a key insight why it’s such a deep and profound pleasure and privilege to live in the State of Israel.