The 2024 U.S. presidential election elicited a spectrum of reactions across the nation. Many rejoiced, expressing optimism, gratitude and happiness. For others, the outcome was met with disappointment, concern and fear about the direction of the country. In some cases the reactions were more pronounced, ranging from joyous celebrations to tearful expressions of sadness. The election raises an important question regardless of the candidate we favored: What is the Torah’s perspective on how we should respond to the election results?
The first 72 hours of the Yom Kippur War in 1973 was the closest Israel has come, Heaven forbid, to destruction. On the most solemn day of the year, Egypt and Syria attacked simultaneously, catching Israel entirely by surprise. Israel’s defensive line on the Egyptian border, thought to be impregnable, fell within two hours. In the north, hundreds of Syrian tanks were rolling down the Golan Heights.
In the days following the Yom Kippur attacks, Israel suffered a number of setbacks and was in desperate need of rearmament. Turning to the U.S. for help, Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and other high officials opposed sending Israel assistance lest they agitate the Arabs or their primary military supplier, the Soviet Union. But in one of history’s great ironies, Richard Nixon alone decided that the U.S. must step in to back Israel, and ordered a massive airlift of armaments and combat equipment that played an integral role in the salvation of the Jewish state. The irony? In the years since the release of the Watergate Tapes it has become one of the established facts of the Nixon mythos that the president was a raging antisemite.
How are we to understand Israel’s improbable deliverance? Two traditional Jewish sources guide us: “Behold, the Guardian of Israel never slumbers nor sleeps” (Psalm 121), and “The Almighty has many agents and messengers.” (Talmud).
In a similar vein, there exists the conventional wisdom why Harry Truman recognized the state of Israel in 1948; it was because he once had a Jewish partner in the haberdashery business who came to him in the White House and asked him for this favor. But here’s the real story.
This story, which appears in the historical archives of the Knesset, was told by Rabbi Shlomo Lorenz, a former Knesset member. Rabbi Lorenz once met Harry S Truman, president of the United States. President Truman told Rabbi Lorenz, “You should know that when I agreed to recognize the state of Israel, it went against the advice of my advisors and it was against every political instinct that I have. But I will tell you why I did it…”
Truman told Lorenz, “I was a little boy growing up in the United States and every little boy growing up in the United States dreams of becoming president. That was my dream. I’ll tell you something else. I was a good Christian boy and I learned my Bible. My hero in the Bible was King Cyrus. This Cyrus is the one who let the Jewish people go back to their homeland and build their Temple. I said, ‘If I ever become President of the United States, I want to imitate my hero and if I ever get the opportunity to let the Jewish people go back to their country and rebuild their Temple that is what I am going to do’ And that, he concluded, ‘is why I recognized the state of Israel.’”
How did it happen that Harry Truman — a man who in private denigrated Jews and the Jewish people — came to improbably adopt King Cyrus as his hero and later play a key role in the foundation of the modern state of Israel? “Behold, the Guardian of Israel never slumbers nor sleeps,” and “The Almighty has many agents and messengers.”
The 2024 U.S. presidential election elicited a range of extreme reactions, reflecting deep political divisions and heightened tensions across the nation and within the Jewish community. But a lesson we have learned throughout history is that only God coronates kings and designates leaders. Certainly, we have to do our part; support, lobby and select who we think will best represent us. But at the same time, we know that it’s God who is running the show. Policies and appointments will be made, but ultimately, they come from Above.
Therefore, regardless of the outcome of an election, a Jew regulates his or her emotions. For those pleased with the outcome of the 2024 election, cautiously express gratitude for what you believe will be better than the alternative. But at the same time, realize that we have no idea what’s about to happen. And to others we say, feel disappointment, but don’t become depressed or despondent when things didn’t go your way, because we know that God is in charge.
So therefore, we try to regulate our emotions in the aftermath of the election. Why? “The king’s heart is in the hand of God, like the rivers of water; He turns it wherever He wishes.” (Proverbs). The timeless wisdom of our Torah teaches us that like in elections, so too in life: God helps those who help themselves. But then, after doing the best we can, relax and draw upon our faith and emunah (trust in God), because we know that the Almighty is running the world.
