Rabbi Ovadia Yosef's Latest Slander

"על פי הרב, בימות המשיח היהודים יזכו לחיי נצח והגויים יאריכו ימים מסיבה תועלתית בלבד. "בישראל לא ישלוט בהם מלאך המוות לעולם ואצל הגויים זה יהיה כמו כל אדם - צריך למות, אבל ייתן להם אריכות ימים. למה זה? תחשוב, חמור שלו אם ימות - יפסיד את הכסף. זה משרת שלו - גם כן יפסיד אותו. לכן נותנים לו אריכות ימים שיעבוד טוב אצל היהודי הזה".

Here is my translation:

"According to the rabbi, after the Messiah arrives, Jews will gain immortality and the other nations will live forever for utilitarian purposes only. "The angel of death will have no authority over the Jews. But those who are not Jews will be as any mortal, and will continue to die. But God will give them longevity. Why? Think about it: a donkey is a man's servant, made to serve man. If he dies, the man loses. Therefore God gives the beast longevity, so that he can continue to live and serve his master..."

As you can see, Ovadia was speaking of the day after the end of the world, not in any way reflecting what happens on earth, in this life, before the messiah arrives.

The gentiles are offended? Alarmed?

Who, Christians whose vision of the end of time calls for the total conversion or extermination of the Jews?

Muslims? Whose end of time describes:

“The Messenger of Allah said: ‘Judgment Day will not come unless Muslims fight the Jews. Muslims will defeat and kill Jews. The Jew will hide behind the stone and the tree, and the stone or tree will say: ‘Oh Muslim, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him! Only the Gharqad tree will not say because it is the tree of Jews.”

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If anyone is afraid of the Jewish end of time, here is some consolation, from Maimonides, an authority greater than Ovadia Yosef's:

Jews are obligated to believe with a full heart in the coming of the Messiah, though he may tarry...

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It's not a good sign that Yosef feels the need to provide comfort to his constituencies by speaking about the coming of the Messiah. Excessive longing for the Messiah, historically, marked times of great distress for the Jewish people. If anyone finds anything to worry about this incident, it is this aspect of it that we ought to pay attention to.

You might want also to consider that this sermon comes at the end of the week in which Ahmadinejad, a head of state, was visiting Israel's Northern border and spewing his usual threats of exterminating "Zionism", and aiming at a very foreseeable future:

"Revealing the truth behind 9/11 and reexamining the black box of these events will resolve most of the problems.

[...]

"I declare: Establishing an independent and impartial committee of investigation, which would determine the roots and causes of the regrettable event of 9/11, is the demand of all the peoples of the region and the world.

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"Any opposition to this legal and human demand means that 9/11 was premeditated in order to achieve the goals of occupation and of confrontation with the nations.

[...]

"My advice to the occupiers of Afghanistan and Iraq is to leave the region, to apologize to the people, and to pay compensation for the damages.

[...]

"If they ignore this kind advice, the powerful hand of the peoples of the region – which are the manifestation of the power of God – will drive them out of the region in shame, and will hand the criminals over to the court of justice."