A Lower World

By: Larry Gordon

It’s a deep philosophical question that we usually don’t devote too much time to.

No, it’s not about where you should raise your family, send your kids to school, or which shul you should daven in or which Torah lectures you should attend so you can imbibe Hashem’s Torah so you can fulfill your potential as a Torah Jew to the greatest extent possible.

It’s a bit more complicated than that. It’s about the world that Hashem created—a physical and material world—that Chassidic philosophy describes as a dirah betachtonim: a lower world in which He can make His dwelling place and where we, the Jewish people, are meant to fulfill our unique role in this complex world, and especially in that tiny sliver at the edge of the Mediterranean Sea we call Israel.

So, let’s start at the beginning and try to wrap our minds around what is the definition of a “lower world.” On one hand, to understand what the lower world is, it’s better to grasp that a lower world by definition is not a higher world or in this context, a G-dly world.

For us to successfully achieve the objective of being Hashem’s instrument in Creation by adding sparks of holiness, it requires that we transform this physical, mundane, lowly world into a home for the Divine Presence to inhabit before it spirals out of control.

In a way, the first simple question when referencing this lower world is: How low are we talking about? To digress, back in the 1960s, there was a song and dance referred to as “The Limbo Rock.” Most of you readers are not going to recall or perhaps you never knew that years ago there was an artist known as Chubby Checker.

Checker invented a dance call “the twist.” Don’t ask me to explain how I know all about that. It would be too difficult, long, and arduous to explain. Anyway, after the sensation that “the twist” created, Mr. Checker, whose real name was Ernest Evans, came up with “the limbo dance” based on the song, “Limbo Rock.” Evans did not create the limbo dance, but adopted it and for a while it was one of the hottest things in the country.

The limbo dance consisted of two people holding up a pole on either side of you and then lowering it incrementally as you bent over backwards and tried to pass underneath it without falling over or dislodging the pole. The background musical refrain was, “How low can you go…?”

So, this brings me back to my original question. If it is Hashem’s will that there be a lower world, the question becomes: How low can you go?

Last week, I thought I might have discovered at least a partial answer to that question in the aftermath of the short-lived political career of Maine’s Graham Platner. For a few months, Mr. Platner was going to run against Republican Senator Susan Collins, who has represented Maine in the Senate since 1997. Collins, 73, was ready to continue serving the people of Maine, at least until Platner, a Democratic Socialist, came along with support from reprobates like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, among others.

Platner was headed for victory in the November election against Collins until the floor caved in beneath him when someone began thinking about the concept of the lower world and its deep, unfathomable bottom and how low a person can sink to reach it. After some disturbing Reddit posts by Mr. Platner came to light, it was time to say hello and goodbye to Graham Platner all at the same time.

Platner was the personification of a deep, dark lower world, yet he won the Democratic primary with 72% of the vote back in June. So, who was this character named Platner who was known for distinguishing himself in a most vile and disgusting way?

Platner became known primarily for trying to cover up a Nazi “Totenkopf” (skull and crossbones) tattoo that he had placed permanently on his chest that resembled a symbol used by Hitler’s paramilitary Schutzstaffel, or SS. He then tried to cover it up with a Celtic knot and two dogs. Platner, who was particularly well-known for his lack of understanding of all topics, went so far as to declare that he did not know what a Nazi skull and crossbones stood for. He claimed that he just didn’t know. That was it.

And there was more. Women came forward claiming that they were raped by him. He said it was not true. Yes, he said, he admitted that he cheated on his wife, but he did not rape anyone. He also added that he had spent time online and in web groups pursuing inappropriate relationships with young women.

He admitted that he was a heavy drinker and only did these horrible violent things when he was extremely drunk. Also, he was a Marine who completed three combat tours in Iraq and may have had some level of PTSD—Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

This man, who never really held a real job or ran any business, said that he was an oyster farmer but he had no clients except for a farm his mother owns. He was reluctant to say anything more or perhaps he just had nothing to say.

It appears the only thing Platner knew was that he was a Democrat Socialist and wanted a free society where the state provides everything from free food to free healthcare. We all know these are Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s ideas—ideas we know will never be implemented.

Democratic Socialist Platner represented the worst there is for politics to offer. But now he’s gone and along with him are his terrible ideas that failed before they were even implemented.

After Platner dropped out, there was only a single criterion that would determine what qualified his replacement to run for his hoped-for seat in the Senate. And that is how the individual feels about Jews and Israel. That’s all there is and that’s all it takes.

What did we know about that champion of the left—Graham Platner—other than he was the new leftist darling of the Democratic Party who cared nothing about the needs of the people of Maine? To support Platner, you had to look the other way about the women who accused him of rape and also disregard his attempts to connect with and pick up underage girls.

And you had to view Israel and Jews with disdain. So, what if key supporters of his candidacy like Senators Bernie Sanders and Chuck Schumer and Brad Lander are all Jews? They are a different type of Jew, one who prefers that Israel’s geographic size be seriously shrunken. They say they can tolerate a free sovereign state of Israel so long as Bibi Netanyahu is out and some leftist who supports removing 600,000 residents from Judea and Samaria is in and Jerusalem is once again divided the way it was prior to 1967.

These people do not only suffer from Trump Derangement Syndrome, but their future outlook for the Middle East and especially Israel is consumed by a unique type of political lunacy.

They subscribe to a lower world where support for Jews and Israel continues to plunge to lower and lower levels with no end in sight. They believe that the more they attack Israel and bring it down, the more their political careers will ascend. It’s really something to observe. That is, especially when they fail politically and Israel overcomes these sad detractors doomed to be written out of the script as their political careers fade into the past—the quicker the better. 

Read more of Larry Gordon’s articles at 5TJT.com. Follow 5 Towns Jewish Times on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter for updates and live videos. Comments, questions, and suggestions are welcome at 5TJT.com and on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter