Covenant Connection

Volume 19.3

April 2026/Nisan 5786

Considering the Current War

We are living in sacred times. The People of Israel are still struggling to develop their toe-hold in the land of promise. In this current stage – following the re-establishment of Jewish life in the coastal sliver of the Land of Israel, old Cana’an, or Philistia (what Ancient Rome named Felix Palestina, “Happy Palestine,” after banishing the Jews from Cana’an/Judea) – it’s a four-front war:

• War with Persia (Iran, “the Land of the Aryans”).

• War with Persia’s surrogates, the Persians’ Arab fellow Shi’ite Muslims in southern Lebanon.

• War in the Land’s own Judea and Samaria with the so-called Filistin or “Palestinians” in the Land’s historic hill country, the heart of it, who – with considerable chutzpah (that is, gall) - claim the whole land as their own and call the Jews foreign invaders.

• And, war in Gaza, with another set of chutzpadik so-called Filistin or “Palestinians,” who attacked Israel in the notorious dastardly attack of October 7, two years ago.

That’s just the kinetic, physically violent, “hot” part of the struggle. Still, that’s a lot, considering that Israel is smaller than Chicago – in the size of its economy and population – in an area smaller than Lake Michigan. But the stakes are high, too, to say the least:

We’re taking about the prospective fulfillment of the whole Biblical story, the completion of many cycles of Jewish history – entry, exile, struggle, exile, return, exile, modern return, and continuing existential struggle – proceeding, we hope, to the glory of a blessed Millennial fulfillment: to Apocalypse!

Used in this sense, by the way, apocalypse is a good thing, signifying a great fundamental Revealing.

_________

Revelation's Prosaic Nature

People talk about Revelation – apocalypse – coming all in a flash, suddenly, but that’s rarely the way of the world. Usually, truth works its way out slowly, incrementally. Consider, for instance, the great scientific discoveries of Louis Pasteur. Most of his fellow scientists, competitors, never even recognized the truth of them. Rather, they kept on teaching their old stuff until they died or retired early, with fewer and fewer students.

One revelation coming from Israel’s war in Gaza is that sometimes even supposedly reliable experts will spout risible – laughable, contemptible – nonsense. In all of human history, no territory has ever been fortified and customized for war like Gaza under Hamas. Never, ever, has anyone built tunnel networks remotely as deep and extensive – next to them, the fortifications of Okinawa and Iwo Jima by the Japanese in World War II are insignificant - and expensive, as the multi-billion dollar fortifications of Hamas. Destroying them - as they must be destroyed, lest they be used again for evil - is a huge job. That doesn’t make that job, or the rest of the physical erasure of Gaza’s terror networks, “genocide”!

I remember staying in one of the settlements, a kibbutz or collective farm, just outside Gaza – and visiting Gaza City – some years ago. The people there never imagined how deeply the people of Gaza hated them. Many of my kibbutznik hosts were butchered on October 7.



The Perennial Question

When a tree falls in a forest where nobody’s around to hear it, does it make a sound? Answer: never is "nobody around!" The Supreme Being, HaShem, the Lord of Abraham and all the Jewish prophets, is always aware and there. As He (we say “He” because HaShem is an active, rather than passive, intelligent Power, despite being beyond sex or gender) lives on Earth and on every planet, asteroid, speck of dust and breath in every galaxy and space in this and every universe. That’s just part of what being God means: He’s involved – not as a part of but as a completely independent Being - with everything that He sustains, while He sustains everything. And, sustaining everything, giving mass and reality to everything, knows, accordingly, everything about everything.

This is not pantheism. A false teacher recently told me that it is. But the great Maimonides – Rambam, Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon (c. 12th Century) - wasn’t telling Israel anything that the prophets hadn’t already recognized when He revealed these things to them: that HaShem, the Lord, is no more divisible than a geometric point; that He is a unity, a single Being, unified, beyond anything material and beyond any thing or force that’s unified, eternal, and all-knowing, because He’s involved in sustaining everything.

People will sniff, “Well, He’s not in the bathroom.” Or, “He can’t tolerate indecency.” But claiming that God suffers from crippling delicacy insults Him. "All-knowing” means all-knowing. Of course we humans – mere animated stardust, as we are – have a hard time with such truths, but it’s good to remember that God is really, genuinely One, that most of Creation consists of hypothesized "dark" matter and "dark" energy; and that the One God Who hears things like trees falling on planets in the remotest galaxies is also the One Who’s intimately involved with you, yourself. He unites Creation with His unity.

Why bring up these matters of theology? Because we’re talking about Israel, which exists as both nation and people – the two are ultimately one – to help raise all humanity to greater God-consciousness.

You are My witnesses, says the Lord, and My servant whom I have chosen

- Isaiah 43:10

I will also give you for a light unto the nations, that My salvation may be unto the end of the earth.

- Isaiah 49:6

The cause of Israel against those who would annihilate Israel is strong enough based on the pure, secular merits, that it shouldn’t need to depend on religious belief. But the fact is that religious belief – or, anyway, ultimate beliefs, based on anti-Jewish worldviews – is determinative. I’ve concluded that theology is everything in the larger struggle.

People convinced that the Jews are just another grubby bunch of people amongst all the different so-called nations dislike the Jews’ pretensions to nationhood, national rights, and historical rights - let alone Divine rights! - vis a vis other groups who want the so-called Holy Land.

People convinced, like both Muslim and Christian supersessionists, that the Muslims, or Christians, have superseded the Jews as God’s “witnesses,” His principal missionary people, hate the thought of the Jews returning to the Holy Land (in apparent fulfillment of Holy prophecy).

People convinced that the “true owners” of the so-called Holy Land are supposedly indigenous, or native, Arabs, rather than Jews, consider Zionism – the national liberation movement of the Jewish people, bringing the Jews back to Mount Tzion in Jerusalem – to be mere window dressing for the stale old story of white racist usurpers, colonialists and imperialists seizing “native” lands.

We are living in sacred times. The People of Israel are still struggling to develop their toe-hold in the land of promise. In this current stage – following the re-establishment of Jewish life in the coastal sliver of the Land of Israel, old Cana’an, or Philistia (what Ancient Rome named Felix Palestina, “Happy Palestine,” after banishing the Jews from Cana’an/Judea) – it’s a four-front war:

“Peace for us means the destruction of Israel. We are preparing for an all-out war, 
 a war which will last for generations.”

- Yasser Arafat, 1980

A couple of weeks ago a naturalized American citizen of Lebanese background took a truck loaded with gasoline and fireworks, and some firearms, and smashed it into the nursery school/day care of the Detroit area’s largest Reform synagogue, Temple Israel. His brother back in Lebanon was serving as an officer in Hezbollah, the Iranian-directed paramilitary, but had been killed the week before in an Israeli air-strike, along with his wife. So he was trying to kill as many Jewish children as he could. He got bogged down, though. The Detroit Jewish community has been spending millions on security, these last few years, and security guards inside had just been drilling under the auspices of the FBI. They stopped him. After a short standoff, trapped in his truck, he used his own gun to kill himself.

A little later, somebody posted on Facebook: “Of the 3,000 people murdered on 9/11, there are roughly 30,000 grieving immediate family members, somewhere like 100,000 grieving extended family members, and about half a million grieving close friends and immediate colleagues. How many of them decided to shoot up a mosque?”

The earliest mention of the Seven Noahide Laws is credited to RAMBAM (1135-1204) in the

Mishneh Torah and although there was a presence of the Noahide Laws mentioned from time to

time it was not until the 1800’s that the modern Noahide Movement was developed to be a

Universal Judaic Religion for Non-Jews under the supervision, guidance and control of

Orthodox Rabbis and it really did not begin as a movement until the 1990’s.The early 2000s marked a moment that could have reshaped the future of the righteous among

the nations. There was real momentum. There were real meetings. The images from those

gatherings are not symbolic. They are historical. Noahides sat together with members of the

nascent Sanhedrin in Israel with the stated goal of establishing a judicial framework for the Bnei

Noach. This was not theory. It was an attempt to give form to the command of dinim, the

obligation to establish courts of justice.

Yet what should have become a foundation became a fracture point.

Instead of producing enduring institutions, the effort dissolved into politics, competing visions,

and personal agendas. Leadership became fragmented. Individuals used the moment to

promote their own authority, their own definitions, and their own direction for what the Noahide

identity should become. What stood before them as a historic responsibility was reduced to

internal division.

This failure is not minor. It strikes at the core of the Noachic covenant itself.

Among the Seven Laws, dinim is unique. It is the only positive command given to the nations as

a society. It is not optional, and it is not theoretical. It is the structural command that ensures the

enforcement of the other six. Without courts, the Noahide framework remains morally

aspirational but legally incomplete. A covenant without a system of justice cannot sustain itself in

the public sphere.

And yet, more than three decades after the modern revival of the Noahide movement, and nearly

a generation after those early Sanhedrin engagements, there is still no broadly recognized,

functioning Beit Din for the nations.

Vendyl Jones helped reignite the awareness of the Noachic covenant in the modern world. Rabbi

Yoel Schwartz served as a central rabbinic voice and was identified with efforts to establish a

court framework for the Bnei Noach. But after his passing, there has been no clearly recognized

successor who carries that mantle with the same visibility and authority. The institutional

continuity that should have followed never materialized.

An Alternative To Institutional Noahism

By

James Regehr, PhD, ThD

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James Regehr is an officially recognized and certified Noahide Righteous Gentile who has since

converted to Judaism.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noahidism

The earliest mention of the Seven Noahide Laws is credited to RAMBAM (1135-1204) in the

Mishneh Torah and although there was a presence of the Noahide Laws mentioned from time to

time it was not until the 1800’s that the modern Noahide Movement was developed to be a

Universal Judaic Religion for Non-Jews under the supervision, guidance and control of

Orthodox Rabbis and it really did not begin as a movement until the 1990’s.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/igetger/permalink/3406958806121043/?

The early 2000s marked a moment that could have reshaped the future of the righteous among

the nations. There was real momentum. There were real meetings. The images from those

gatherings are not symbolic. They are historical. Noahides sat together with members of the

nascent Sanhedrin in Israel with the stated goal of establishing a judicial framework for the Bnei

Noach. This was not theory. It was an attempt to give form to the command of dinim, the

obligation to establish courts of justice.

Yet what should have become a foundation became a fracture point.

Instead of producing enduring institutions, the effort dissolved into politics, competing visions,

and personal agendas. Leadership became fragmented. Individuals used the moment to

promote their own authority, their own definitions, and their own direction for what the Noahide

identity should become. What stood before them as a historic responsibility was reduced to

internal division.

This failure is not minor. It strikes at the core of the Noachic covenant itself.

Among the Seven Laws, dinim is unique. It is the only positive command given to the nations as

a society. It is not optional, and it is not theoretical. It is the structural command that ensures the

enforcement of the other six. Without courts, the Noahide framework remains morally

aspirational but legally incomplete. A covenant without a system of justice cannot sustain itself in

the public sphere.

And yet, more than three decades after the modern revival of the Noahide movement, and nearly

a generation after those early Sanhedrin engagements, there is still no broadly recognized,

functioning Beit Din for the nations.

Vendyl Jones helped reignite the awareness of the Noachic covenant in the modern world. Rabbi

Yoel Schwartz served as a central rabbinic voice and was identified with efforts to establish a

court framework for the Bnei Noach. But after his passing, there has been no clearly recognized

successor who carries that mantle with the same visibility and authority. The institutional

continuity that should have followed never materialized.

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This raises a difficult but unavoidable question.

Why has the one command that requires structure, authority, and public implementation been

left without structure, without authority, and without implementation?

The answer is not that the command disappeared. The answer is that responsibility was

deferred. Some waited for rabbinic leadership to build it. Others assumed the time was not yet

right. Still others attempted to claim leadership prematurely, further fragmenting the effort. The

result is the same: delay, stagnation, and absence of a unified judicial framework.

But the command of dinim does not wait for perfect conditions.

If anything, the lesson of those early meetings is not that the effort should be abandoned, but

that it must be approached differently. The foundation cannot be built on personalities. It must

be built on structure, humility, and submission to authentic halachic guidance. It must grow in

stages, with seriousness and discipline, rather than ambition and self-appointment.

The images from those meetings stand as both evidence and warning. They testify that the

opportunity was real. They also testify that

opportunity alone is not enough.

If the righteous among the nations are to fulfill

their role within the Noachic covenant, then the

responsibility cannot remain indefinitely

postponed. Courts of justice are not someone

else’s command to fulfill on their behalf. They

are part of their own obligation.

The question is no longer whether it should

have been done.

The question is whether it will be done now, and

whether it will be done correctly.

1. They had the goal of establishing a judicial framework for the Bnei Noach.

2. They had the goal of establishing a Beit Din for the Nations based on authentic halachic guidance.

3. They said that the establishment of Courts of Justice falls on the righteous of the Nations.

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Contrarily, the very nature of the Sheva Mitzvot (Seven Laws), is that they were given to be

universal for all mankind—not just for the “righteous gentiles”. In fact, the imperative is that the

unrighteous pagans of the nations are the ones who are to follow these Mitzvot!

To establish a Beit Din sponsored by Noahide and/or the Sanhedrin imposes an obvious Judaic bent

when it is based on authentic halachic guidance. This completely undermines the integrity and

legitimacy of the existence of the nations as distinct from Bnei Yisroel.

While on one hand, as stated, without courts, the Noahide framework remains morally aspirational but

legally incomplete, on the other hand, in the absence of authentic halachic guidance, the Nations must

grapple with and articulate exactly how the Sheva Mitzvot are to be expressed in their specific

ethnocultural national identity.

Even as it has been said that the Torah was written without vowels in order to both allow and foster

differing understandings, perspectives and interpretations, so also the Sheva Mitzvot must also be kept

devoid of “authentic halachic guidance” in order that each people may understand, interpret and

express the Mitzvot in their own way.

There must therefore be no centralized, sanctioned, judicial framework for Bnei Noach; no halachic Beit

Din and the establishment and control of the Courts of Justice must remain in the purview of the

“unrighteous” nations themselves!

The Sheva Mitzvot; however, form the moral aspiration of the nations but they do not encapsulate or

even reflect humanity’s responsibility to God. The Sheva Mitzvot are not about serving God as much as

they reflect some basic morality, when it comes to God, and humanity’s responsibility to one another

and Creation.

The Sheva Mitzvot express the basic principles of how people are to get along with God, Creation and

one another but the Sheva Mitzvot fall short because they do not express what is truly important.

Hoshe’e HaNavi, (Hosea, the Prophet), emphasizes the original and most foundational covenant God

has ever made with humanity and he refers to it as the Covenant With Adam, (man/mankind).

Hoshe’e said, “I want you to love Me rather than just sacrifice to Me, I want you to know Me

more than I want your burnt offerings. But like Adam you broke My Covenant; and betrayed My

trust. (Hosea 6.6-7)

God’s Covenant with Adam was and remains for us to KNOW God and to LOVE God.

While this Covenant is echoed time and again throughout Torah, the Nevi’im and the Ketuvim, (Hebrew

Bible), in places like the Sh’ma and others, knowing and loving God can neither be qualified nor

quantified and therefore cannot be regulated, dictated, adjudicated or controlled by some authentic

halachic guidance.

While some may insist that one can know God through studying Torah, others might say that one

cannot know God simply by studying Torah but can only know God by performing His Mitzvot. Dao’id

HaMelek, (King David), in Psalm 46.10 wrote “Be still to know that I am God” suggesting that the only

way to get to know God is in quietness and solitude.

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To be fair, studying Torah is very good and one is able to know much ABOUT God from it. Similarly, the

performance of His Mitzvot is also a way to know ABOUT God … but knowing God is something very

different!

Indeed, even the New Testament writer, Paul, told the people of Athens the following.

The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live

in temples made by man, nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything,

since He, Himself, gives to all mankind life and breath and everything. And He made from one

man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted

periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, and perhaps feel

their way toward Him and find Him. Yet He is actually not far from each one of us, for “‘In Him we

live and move and have our being’; as even some of your own poets have said.

Acts 17.24-28

Similarly, invitation after invitation is given for us to seek God with all our heart if we want to find Him.

Jeremiah 29.13 says, “You will seek Me and find Me, when you seek Me with all your heart.”

1 Chronicles 28.9 says, “If you seek God, He will be found by you.”

Long before there was any such thing as “organized religion”, there was God.

Adam and Eve walked with God in the Garden of Eden and talked with Him Face to face as friends,

(Genesis 3.9-11).

Enoch walked with God and God took him, (Genesis 5.24).

Noah found grace in the Eyes of the Lord and walked with God, (Genesis 6.8-9).

Isaiah 41.8 says that Abraham was God’s friend and God used to go to Abraham’s home and visit with

him—Face to face. According to Genesis 18, God even stayed for supper and ate in Abraham’s home

with him.

According to Genesis 32.30, Jacob spent time with God Face to face and actually ended up having a

fight with God but they talked and worked things out between them.

Moses used to speak with God Face to face, Exodus 33.11 says, as a man talks with a friend.

In those ancient times, Psalm 145.18 says that God drew near to all who would call on Him, and going

back to the very earliest of times, even at the time of Seth, the son of Adam and Eve, Genesis 4.26 says

that people began calling upon the Name of the Lord.

This is God’s Covenant with Adam—to KNOW Him and to LOVE Him.

As Noahides, it is not your job to be the courts of justice in your land. Courts of justice already exist in

every land. They have been established by the people of their lands.

It is the job of the Noahides not to overturn or replace the courts of justice in each land but rather to do

what they can to correct or prevent every travesty of justice the courts permit.

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It is true that the court and judicial systems of many lands have become corrupt an ineffective.

Noahides need to be a voice to help restore their integrity and purpose!

The courts of justice commanded in the Sheva Mitzvot are not religious courts. They are to be the civil

courts for that is the place where justice must be present.

The Sheva Mitzvot do not the framework of a religion form. The Sheva Mitzvot are the universal laws for

all humanity.

The “religion” of the righteous gentile must be the Adamic Covenant which contains neither sacrifices,

offerings or sacred rites. It does not utilize any Siddur nor hymnary. It does not honour festivals or

moedim, except the recognition of God’s blessing of Shabbas as a special day each week although no

imperative was given to Adam regarding him remembering to keep Shabbas holy.

Therefore; being Noahide at present is best described as non-Jews striving to live under the

authentic halachic guidance of Jewish Rabbis rather than simply following the Sheva Mitzvot;

however, while the Sheva Mitzvot are universal laws for humanity to get along with God and one

another, they are not God’s primary covenant with humanity.

It is God’s primary goal the the nations of the world will come to know Him and to love Him.

This job was not given to the Noahides. It is our Jewish sacred duty. We are the ones He has chosen to

tell the nations how they can know God for themselves.

Yes, God has told us much about Himself in our Bible but that is not the only way to come to know

God! He can be known through creation, itself. He can speak to people through dreams. There are no

limits to the number of ways that people can know and experience God!

Maybe as Jews, we should focus our efforts less and less on Noahides and the Sheva Mitzvot and

more and more on helping the nations know God!

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The earliest mention of the Seven Noahide Laws is credited to RAMBAM (1135-1204) in the

Mishneh Torah and although there was a presence of the Noahide Laws mentioned from time to

time it was not until the 1800’s that the modern Noahide Movement was developed to be a

Universal Judaic Religion for Non-Jews under the supervision, guidance and control of

Orthodox Rabbis and it really did not begin as a movement until the 1990

Here in Detroit

By Michael Dallen
Detroit
April 2026
Nisan 5786

United States of America