{"id":2060,"date":"2025-08-28T08:36:04","date_gmt":"2025-08-28T08:36:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.maurobiglino.com\/stato-nazione-bibbia-ricordando-amalek\/"},"modified":"2025-08-28T08:45:44","modified_gmt":"2025-08-28T08:45:44","slug":"nation-state-bible-remembering-amalek","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.maurobiglino.com\/en\/nation-state-bible-remembering-amalek\/","title":{"rendered":"Nation-State and Bible (remembering Amalek)"},"content":{"rendered":"

[vc_row fade_scroll=”yes” enable_content_animation=”yes” animation_preset=”Fade In Up” css=”.vc_custom_1747930724485{padding-bottom: 25px !important;}”][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”2\/3″][vc_column_text el_class=”abstract”]In my work, I do something simple: I read the Bible literally, \u201cpretending it’s true,\u201d and use it as a historical lens to interpret current events. The Bible is certainly not enough to explain geopolitics, interests, and strategies, but some key issues of the present\u2014Israel<\/strong>, the 2018 Nation-State Law,<\/strong> the political reference to \u201cAmalek\u201d\u2014become more understandable when viewed in continuity with the biblical text.[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row enable_content_animation=”yes” animation_preset=”Fade In Up” css=”.vc_custom_1747930712862{margin-top: 20px !important;margin-bottom: 50px !important;}”][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”2\/3″][vc_video link=”https:\/\/youtu.be\/Vn5CJloX2No” align=”center”][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row enable_content_animation=”yes” animation_preset=”Fade In Up” css=”.vc_custom_1725610661138{margin-top: 30px !important;}”][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”2\/3″][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n

2018: the Nation-State Law and the biblical echo of identity<\/h2>\n

In 2018, the Knesset<\/strong> passed a law defining Israel<\/strong> as \u201cthe historic homeland of the Jewish people<\/strong>,\u201d encouraging communities reserved for Jews, and downgrading Arabic from an official language to a language with \u201cspecial status.\u201d As Gideon Levy wrote in Haaretz, this step explicitly codifies an identity priority that makes it difficult to be \u201cJewish and democratic\u201d at the same time. Even Israeli institutional figures have expressed concerns.<\/p>\n

As a reader of the Bible, I see an ancient pattern resurfacing here: Yahweh wants a distinct, \u201cconsecrated\u201d people, heirs of Jacob\/Israel and the twelve tribes. The biblical narrative\u2014from the calling of Abraham (about 4,000 years ago) to the conquest of an already inhabited land\u2014is a story of separation and belonging. This does not \u201cjustify\u201d anything in the present, but it explains why certain choices find a ready-made symbolic framework. The Shoah is a dramatic break that marks modernity, but it does not exhaust the theme of today’s political legitimacy. The 2018 law legally translates an identity that the Bible had already clearly addressed.[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row enable_content_animation=”yes” animation_preset=”Fade In Up” responsive_css=”margin_top_large:50px|margin_bottom_large:20px|margin_bottom_small:30px”][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”2\/3″][vc_single_image image=”1371″ alignment=”center”][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row enable_content_animation=”yes” animation_preset=”Fade In Up” css=”.vc_custom_1747930770591{margin-top: 20px !important;}”][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”2\/3″][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n

\u201cRemember Amalek\u201d: when sacred vocabulary becomes political code<\/h2>\n

In recent times, Benjamin Netanyahu said, \u201cRemember Amalek.\u201d Who is Amalek? Genesis 36<\/b> places him in the lineage of Esau, Jacob’s twin brother. In Exodus 17, the Amalekites attack Israel at Rephidim: I read the episode without theological filters\u2014Moses climbs the hill and raises his hands like a military signal to boost the morale of his people, until Joshua prevails. The key point, however, is 1 Samuel 15: Yahweh orders Saul to \u201cdevote Amalek to destruction\u201d; Saul spares King Agag and the best livestock and loses his kingdom because \u201cobedience is better than sacrifice.\u201d<\/p>\n

Josephus<\/b>, in Antiquities of the Jews<\/i>, describes even more explicitly sieges, war machines, and the massacre \u201cbeginning with women and children,\u201d justified as obedience to divine order. This is why the reference to \u201cAmalek\u201d acts today as a code for absolute enemy and annihilation: a short word, but with a semantic charge so powerful that it has crossed the millennia and landed in contemporary debate.[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row enable_content_animation=”yes” animation_preset=”Fade In Up” css=”.vc_custom_1747930712862{margin-top: 20px !important;margin-bottom: 50px !important;}”][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”2\/3″][vc_video link=”https:\/\/youtu.be\/fN-s63iXI4k” align=”center”][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row enable_content_animation=”yes” animation_preset=”Fade In Up” css=”.vc_custom_1747930770591{margin-top: 20px !important;}”][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”2\/3″][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n

The Jaeger case (1960): when the Bible becomes a normative alibi<\/h2>\n

In 1960, the jurist and constitutional judge Nicola Jaeger<\/b>, in Il diritto nella Bibbia<\/i> (Law in the Bible), went so far as to consider \u201cwars of annihilation\u201d as the result of the instinct for self-preservation, even defining the attempts of three thousand years ago as \u201cmodest\u201d compared to modern genocides. I quote this passage because it shows the drift that is always lurking: if the sacred text becomes a direct normative source for politics, then violence obtains retrospective justification. I do not accept this: the Bible, read literally, tells us what is written, but it certainly does not authorize us to repeat it.[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row enable_content_animation=”yes” animation_preset=”Fade In Up” responsive_css=”margin_top_large:50px|margin_bottom_large:20px|margin_bottom_small:30px”][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”2\/3″][vc_single_image image=”1775″ alignment=”center”][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row enable_content_animation=”yes” animation_preset=”Fade In Up” css=”.vc_custom_1747930838361{margin-top: 20px !important;}”][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”2\/3″][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n

The Bible as active (but not acquittal) history<\/h2>\n

I repeat: the Bible is also history. In Israel, archaeology has identified 53 biblical figures<\/b> attested to by external sources (from Egypt, Syria, Moab, the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, Babylon, Persia). This is useful data, of course, because it confirms the historicity of many passages. But \u201chistorical\u201d does not mean \u201cprescriptive.\u201d The Scriptures can help us understand the cultural matrices of the present\u2014lexicon, symbols, political genealogies\u2014without absolving today’s choices. The political use of the Bible remains slippery ground: the more it is quoted, the more it is necessary to read it with philological precision, without theological filters and without turning it into a weapon.[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row enable_content_animation=”yes” animation_preset=”Fade In Up” responsive_css=”margin_top_large:50px|margin_bottom_large:20px|margin_bottom_small:30px”][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”2\/3″][vc_single_image image=”2056″ alignment=”center”][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row enable_content_animation=”yes” animation_preset=”Fade In Up” css=”.vc_custom_1747930857330{margin-top: 20px !important;}”][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”2\/3″][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n

Conclusion<\/h2>\n

The Bible, read literally, remains \u201cactive\u201d in the present: it shapes identity, vocabulary, and political imagery. But for me, it is not \u2014 and must not become \u2014 a moral shortcut or a pass for today’s choices. The two examples I mentioned\u2014the 2018 Nation-State Law and the reference to \u201cAmalek\u201d\u2014show how much the biblical heritage continues to guide discourse and decisions; precisely for this reason, they impose a greater responsibility: to use the Scriptures to understand, not to strike; to read history, not to reproduce annihilation.<\/p>\n

My method remains simple: read what is written, without theological filters, place it in its historical context, and recognize how much that lexicon still applies. \u201cObedience rather than sacrifice\u201d is not a license for violence in the present; \u201cAmalek\u201d cannot become a code that transforms the enemy into an absolute target. The historicity of the text \u2014 also confirmed by the many biblical characters attested to outside the Bible \u2014 is not a political mandate: it absolves no one. The responsibility for choices belongs to the people of today, to international law, to politics, to ethics.<\/p>\n

Forty centuries after Abraham, the heavens can \u201ccontinue to be on fire\u201d not because the Bible demands it, but because we decide how to use it in the public sphere. I propose this: philological precision, historical memory, and the assumption of responsibility. The Bible can help us understand; it cannot\u2014and must not\u2014absolve.[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row enable_content_animation=”yes” animation_preset=”Fade In Up” css=”.vc_custom_1661934423901{padding-top: 40px !important;padding-bottom: 40px !important;}” row_hide=”hidden-xs”][vc_column width=”1\/6″][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”2\/3″ css=”.vc_custom_1661934759256{border-top-width: 1px !important;border-right-width: 1px !important;border-bottom-width: 1px !important;border-left-width: 1px !important;border-left-color: #000000 !important;border-left-style: solid !important;border-right-color: #000000 !important;border-right-style: solid !important;border-top-color: #000000 !important;border-top-style: solid !important;border-bottom-color: #000000 !important;border-bottom-style: solid !important;}”][vc_row_inner content_placement=”middle” gap=”0″][vc_column_inner width=”1\/2″ enable_content_animation=”yes” animation_preset=”Fade In Left” css=”.vc_custom_1752740198937{padding-right: 40px !important;padding-left: 40px !important;}”][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n

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