I have recently heard people saying that the Arabs are as successful as they are against the Jews because they are descendants of Yishma’el , another son of Avraham, and they have a powerful faculty for prayer. God listened to Yishma’el and now He is listening to their fervent, sincere prayers five times a day.
I find this idea odious and contradictory to the belief in Hashem and that we are His chosen people.
If there are people out there who think that this will inspire Jews to be more righteous and daven more and better they are off the track. How could anyone imagine that the prayers of terrorists who blow themselves up with innocent people on a bus or a pizza shop would be answered by Hashem.
We read in Parshas ‘Ekev last Shabbos:
6. For you are a holy people to the Lord your God; the Lord your God has chosen you to be a special people to himself, above all peoples that are upon the face of the earth.
7. The Lord did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because you were more in number than any people; for you were the fewest of all peoples;
8. But because the Lord loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn to your fathers, has the Lord brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of slaves, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
9. Know therefore that the Lord your God, he is God, the faithful God, which keeps covenant and mercy with those who love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations;
10. And repays those who hate him to their face, to destroy them; he will not be slack to him who hates him, he will repay him to his face.
11. You shall therefore keep the commandments, and the statutes, and the judgments, which I command you this day, to do them.
12. Therefore it shall come to pass, if you give heed to these judgments, and keep, and do them, that the Lord your God shall keep with you the covenant and the mercy which he swore to your fathers;
13. And he will love you, and bless you, and multiply you; he will also bless the fruit of your womb, and the fruit of your land, your grain, and your wine, and your oil, the produce of your cows, and the flocks of your sheep, in the land which he swore to your fathers to give you.
14. You shall be blessed above all people; there shall not be male or female barren among you, or among your cattle.
15. And the Lord will take away from you all sickness, and will put none of the evil diseases of Egypt, which you know, upon you; but will lay them upon all those who hate you.
16. And you shall destroy all the people which the Lord your God shall deliver you; your eye shall have no pity upon them; neither shall you serve their gods; for that will be a snare to you.
17. If you shall say in your heart, These nations are more than I; how can I dispossess them?
18. You shall not be afraid of them; but shall well remember what the Lord your God did to Pharaoh, and to all Egypt;
19. The great trials which your eyes saw, and the signs, and the wonders, and the mighty hand, and the stretched out arm, whereby the Lord your God brought you out; so shall the Lord your God do to all the people of whom you are afraid.
20. Moreover the Lord your God will send the hornet among them, until those who are left, and hide themselves from you, are destroyed.
21. You shall not be frightened by them; for the Lord your God is among you, a mighty God and awesome.
22. And the Lord your God will clear away those nations before you, little by little; you may not destroy them at once, lest the beasts of the field grow numerous upon you.
23. But the Lord your God shall deliver them to you, and shall destroy them with a mighty destruction, until they are destroyed.
24. And he shall deliver their kings into your hand, and you shall destroy their name from under heaven; there shall no man be able to stand before you, until you have destroyed them.
-- Devarim 7
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Maimonides seems to place emphasis on the number 14, as seen in the Treatise of Logic, which has 14 proofs, as seen in the Mishneh Torah, which has 14 books, as seen in the Sefer Mitsvot, which has 14 principles, and as seen in the Moreh Nevuchim, which of course has 14 categories.
This recurrence begs the question of what intrinsic significance should be drawn to ‘14’, if any at all.
In my initial poking around and speculating the reason behind the striking pattern of 14, my father shared with me the following hiddush from Rav David Cohen:
The Rambam had been very attached to his brother David who had been supporting him financially throughout his scholarship. Rambam underwent a terrible emotional blow upon learning of his brother's death at sea. Hence, to credit his brother's memory he organized his work in sets of '14' to commemorate the numerical value which is found in the gematria of David’s name: daled vav daled=14.
After consulting with many Maimonidean scholars I have since collected enough background and in-depth material that I can ably refute Rav Cohen’s teshuva. Particularly because the Rambam wasn't someone to act on feelings, let alone dedicating things to anyone. Rambam was devoted 100% reason and tradition. Even if Rambam would have used the gematria, David had passed away after Rambam had written the majority of his work, therefore the urge to memorialize him would not have logically occurred to him prior to the death of his brother.
-esther est625@aol.com
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