Your Majesty Herod the Great, Your Royal Highness Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa, Your Graces of eighteen nations, High Priest Annanel and assembled Cohanim, Conscripted Fathers of the Roman Senate, my illustrious predecessors Rabbi Lord Shemaya-ben-Xerxes and Rabbi Lord Avtalyon-ben-Artaxerxes, my beloved colleagues in the Sanhedrin, Your Excellencies the assembled elders of all twelve tribes, Commanders, Rabbanim, Legates, Dayanim, Tribunes, Chazzanim, Centurions, Shameshes, President and Board of the United Synagogues of Judea, Chair and Distinguished Members of the United Board of Diaspora Synagogues and Communities, Chairs and members of the United Synagogue Brotherhoods, Chairwomen and members of the United Synagogue Sisterhoods, Chair and members of the Jerusalem Earthquake Relief Committee, amalgamated builders of Habonim Dror, indispensable young patrolmen of Hashomer Tza'ir, cherished young people of United Synagogue Youth, B'nai Brith and New Israel Foundation for Temple Youth, to all our wonderful Musicians and Decorative Artisans of this magnificent temple, distinguished guests,
In the beginning, I want to thank Your Royal Highness Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa for the glory of your attendance as your first official act as Governor of Syria. Never before in the history of our people have we been graced with so imperial a presence. It is the greatest possible testimony to the strength of the Roman Empire's unity, and the terrific splendor with which Rome has earned its authority. We are overwhelmed by your greatness. May the Almighty Without End bless you in all the good that you do, and may Rome and Jerusalem continue in partnership for ages to come. Strength, Strength, we can strengthen one another.
I want to thank our two newly created Lords who shall always be the Rabbis who affected the direction of my life more than all others: Rabbi Lord Shemaya and Rabbi Lord Avtalyon, for the magnificence of their teachings. As Menahem the Essene and I assume the posts of Zugot after the glories of your shockingly exceptional leadership, we can look to your examples: your worldly wisdom, the point of your moral compasses, your intrepid moral bravery, and your redoubtable commitment to the Jewish people. I was with them on the day of the earthquake. And right where you sit Rabbi Lamech ben Mehallel, when it came time to pursue the war against the Nabatheans, Rabbi Lord Avtalyon advocated for the greatest possible commitment to the Benyaminites. He argued with such force that it often seems to me as though he brought down the walls of the Temple and brought down so much of Jerusalem with it. I was there when Rabbi Lord Shemaya would sit in the room of the Sanhedrin and experience his mournful visions of the old Sanhedrin, murdered in cold blood. It is their commitment to the most progressive future for Judea that we owe this bewitchingly gorgeous temple renovation, and to them we owe the commitment to repentance that comes from Herod the Great.
Herod the Great, how deserving you've been of that moniker since your atonement. If you have overcome your inclination and not been overcome by it, you have reason to rejoice. There are no words any among us may provide for the naches of your change, your commitment to rebuilding Jerusalem, rehousing the displaced, providing for the poor. If I may alter a quote from another great king: we are an army of your sheep, lead by a lion!
It is a new day in Judea! Not in eight hundred years has a king had such occasion for wisdom's accumulation, and not even King Solomon could look upon such works you've wrought. Your Majesty is already Herod the Great, but you, our king, have your chance to take your place among the great leaders of our people: Matthias and Judah Maccabee, Mordecai and Queen Esther, Ezra and Nehamia, David and Solomon, Moses and Joshua, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph... Herod...
To those who point out that Herod the Great cannot trace his yichus to Mount Sinai, Abraham nor his issue could neither. To those who point out Herod the Great was not educated in Torah, neither was Moses. A new age for the Jewish people begins with your majesty. You have committed terrible sins, but for seventy years of war and death, so have we all. If our King must repent his foul wickedness, so must we all. The difference between Herod the Great and us is that our land's peace was brought by him. Your Majesty, you have resurrected our people, and to you now falls the hard part: the challenge of keeping the Jewish people strong in a modern world where so many forces can pull us apart.
The prophet Isaiah said: "Remember ye not the former things, neither consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth, shall ye not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert."
And therefore I put to you all three questions addressed to three different bodies.
The first body is you, the Jewish people: If our illustrious king, Herod the Great, was not for himself, whom among us would have been for him? Herod the Great came from small circumstances. Not a century ago his family converted to our faith by the sword, and his grandfather Antipa an Edomite fisherman in the Gulf of Aqaba. The People of Esau and Ishmael have an honored place as our brothers and neighbors, and we all must work in intertribal dialogue to let all the peoples of Kadosh Baruch Hu live together in peaceful accord. Herod the Great is a model to our young of how to collaborate with people different from us and a model to us all of individual initiative.
The second body is the Jewish State, and the incarnation of us all in its sovereign, Herod the Great. Your Majesty, with all modesty and good intent, I ask you as I have many times in private: if your royal self is only for yourself, who are you? The people of Judea have seen and survived so much. Our peoplehood is full of as many villains and heroes. We have survived Ramses, we survived Nebuchadnezzar, we survived Haman, we survived Antiochus, we will survive whatever comes, but to your choice comes the challenge of how we may thrive. Just as none are with the High Priest when he enters the Holy of Holiest, no one sits on the Judean throne but you. Responsibility for us all is a burden to only you, Augustus princeps, and God. I therefore hope the High Priest does not mind me paraphrasing him, but may God protect and defend you, our unquestionable King, may the face of God shine upon you and grant you with His grace, may you see the face of God, and may you, our great King, give us peace. Amen.
The third body is us, all of us. King and subject, Rabbi and layman, Jew and Gentile, Hebrew and Roman. I ask of you: "If not now, when." Jerusalem knows peace again. Rome knows peace again. Our Messiah has not come, but the world for which our grandfathers dreamed is here and now. God said through the prophet Isaiah: Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness." So I say yet again: if not now, when? Fear is the proof of a degenerate mind. No one develops courage by being happy in their relationships every day. They develop it by surviving difficult times and challenging adversity. Whatever comes from God is impossible for man to turn back, and God has given us peace. So yet again let's say together, three times:
If not now, (crowd) when?
(gestures and they say with him) If not now, when?
(gestures and the crowd says themselves) If not now, when?
And let us all say,
(Hillel and crowd together) Amen
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Agrippa: Well I don't like that responsa, but I obviously don't speak Hebrew. What did he say?
Assinius Pollio: Nothing particularly treasonous but these Jews have a way of seeming to praise while actually insulting them.
Agrippa: Let's keep an eye on those Rabbis, they could be trouble.
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