A chapter from my book.
Aleinu
(Hebrew: עָלֵינוּ, “upon us”) or Aleinu leshabei'ach (“[it is] upon us to praise [God]”), meaning
“it is upon us or it is our obligation or duty to praise God.” A Jewish prayer
recited at the end of each of the three daily services. It is also recited
following the New Moon blessing and after a circumcision is performed.
—Wikipedia, Aleinu
y
quest for perfect prayer and for spiritual insights evolved, not just at
synagogues on the ground but also one time during my davening on
a jumbo jet flight at an altitude of 39,000 feet and a speed of 565 miles per
hour. That is where, by happenstance on an airplane in 1982, I met Rabbi Meir
Kahane, an American-Israeli Orthodox rabbi, an ultra-nationalist writer and
political figure and, later, a member of the Israeli Knesset.
I recognized Kahane
right away when I saw him on the flight. He was a famous New York Jew. In the
1960s and 70s, Kahane had organized the Jewish Defense League (JDL). Its goal
was to protect Jews in New York City's high-crime neighborhoods and to instill
Jewish pride. Kahane also was active in the struggle for the rights of Soviet
Jews to emigrate from Russia and to immigrate to Israel. By 1969, he was
proposing emergency Jewish mass-immigration to Israel because of the imminent
threat he saw of a second Holocaust in an anti-Semitic United States. He argued
that Israel be made into a state modeled on Jewish religious law, that it annex
the West Bank and Gaza Strip and that it urge all Arabs to voluntarily leave
Israel or to be ejected by force.
It was then, by
coincidence, that I traveled with Kahane on a long Tower Air flight to Israel.
As was common on flights to Israel, a few hours after takeoff, Jewish men
gathered at the back of the plane. As the sun became visible in the Eastern
sky, they formed a minyan, kind of an ad hoc synagogue. In this unusual and
somewhat mystical setting, I prayed the morning services with the rabbi and
others at the back of the jumbo jet.