In what way is the Jewish people different from all the other peoples?  Some would pin this difference on external considerations, but this is a superficial approach that misses the point and obscures the essentials.

     From a general historical perspective, it is important to emphasize Rashi’s position here: Since a promise was given to Moses that God would not exchange the Jewish people for any other people, the Jewish people does not require any signature on a peace treaty, nor is it required to consider the nations from the political point of view.  The non-Jew can sometimes kill the Jew, but never the Jewish people.

    In today’s political scene, as long as the Holy Land is inhabited by a people that is called Yisrael as a political entity, we do not require the protection of any country whatsoever, and policy  should be determined according to what is good for the Jews, without taking trouble to find favor in the eyes of the nations.

    As to what is unique about the Jewish people, it seems absurd that that wicked gentile would understand Jewish uniqueness more than the Jews themselves.  Nevertheless, the two distinctions made by Bilam the Wicked, remain the reliable indicators, the litmus tests for the character of the Jewish people.

Bilam Harasha discerned the fact that the people of Israel excel at human quality.  Psychology investigates the development of intelligence and of emotion, yet misses the essential: The talent for humanness.

    Following research studies on intelligence development, one feels a doubt stealing into one's heart: Perhaps Piaget was right after all that emotions are determined by intelligence level.  Fortunately, the American “nerd” does not fit this theory, being that mentally, his level is that of a genius, whereas emotionally, he is retarded.

    It is true that emotions require confrontation with social reality and with the battle for survival in order to mature.  However, emotional development also depends on other factors that are far more decisive than all the environmental factors: These are heredity, and human quality.

    Yet these basic elements require more than a supportive environment, as mentioned.  They require also a structure, a framework, “a vessel to hold blessing”.  This takes the form of a balanced relationship between values (authority) and personal freedom.

    The more limited an individual is in his ability to enjoy freedom, whether due to his age or due to his personal level (though not necessarily his mental level) the more he requires an authority to support him, and even to determine the extent of his decision-making ability.

    External authority eventually merges and aligns itself with the internal system, as development progresses, to become a value-based sense of identity, and thus fear becomes awe.  Personality develops by a process of internalization – from outer to inner.  Mental awareness and judgment aspire toward objectivity, while on the emotional side, value-based judgment aspires toward the absolute. 

Thus the external authority that initially motivated a limited person becomes transformed into the adoption of, and even dvaikut, the attachment to the Godly absolute.

    Although for a limited person, acceptance of authority is conditional on his own egocentric feelings and on his own egocentric judgment – as long as it appears to him that God is good to him, he returns love to Him; the moment he imagines that God is not on his side, he rejects Him – yet a truly human personality becomes the receptacle in which all elements meet in encounter with one another: Emotions, intelligence, and the experience that one has accumulated through one’s battle for survival. 

Without this human capacity, the general tendency is for the emotions to overpower all the other systems, and to capture them, penetrating into territories that do not rightfully belong to the emotions.  This creates conflict between all the various components: Each harms the other, and the balance is upset.

    Compulsive neurosis results, born of the clash between “doing” needs and “being” needs, between duty and pleasure, between belonging and freedom, and all the other opposing pairs.  Extremism in the direction of morality removes the justification for one’s own existence and causes depression.  The very justification for the fact that one exists is called into question.  One begins to repress one’s own personal, physical needs, and this then becomes a cause for masochism.  At this point, the entire package comes undone.  The sexual needs, belonging to the physical side of the human component, lose the delicate balance that they require.  After this, external stimulus enters the picture, triggering the counter reaction: Sexual perversion.

    Basic to an understanding of sexuality is the perception that the sexual mechanism does not exist on its own in human beings.  It is only in the other animals that it functions as a separate unit.  With man, it is an expression of all his personal/human needs.  Therefore it requires balance, between “doing” and “being”, between duty and pleasure; it is a structure of reality that includes all existential and material needs, as well as one’s imagination and one’s personal feelings toward one’s partner.

    In fact, sexuality contains all of the existential needs within itself, supplying them with a constantly renewing supply of energy.  Uprooting sexuality, or isolating it, effectively uproots the central focus of the entire system that is called a human being.

     “How good are your tents, Jacob” is the secret of balance between all opposing vectors on the human plane and on the plane of values.  Becoming a couple and becoming a family was invented by the Torah, and Bilam the Wicked discovers this and envies the Jewish people.  Therefore he advises the enemy of Israel to focus on this specific point – this quiet pool in which all human needs are mended and find their completing balance, according to the principle of amad ve’irev midat hadin bemidat harahamim: “God stood forth and mingled the measure of compassion into the measure of judgment.” 

    The Jewish home balances emotion with rationality and with reality, while the umbrella of authority finds human expression in the image of the father – the practical and human actualization of absolute authority. 

    A defect in the Jewish home throws off the balance.  One becomes exposed to attack.  Once the healing and repairing effect of sexuality within a framework of ‘in the right time with the right person’ is undermined, one becomes vulnerable to the perversions – such as cruelty, egoism, and above all sexual perversion. 

    A young man who is intelligent and aware of his condition (homosexual) relates that his mother passed away when he was very young, and that he grew up with a vicious stepmother who constantly and deliberately plotted against him.  He hates women, and has developed severe paranoia towards men as well, but mainly towards women.

    Sexuality is the yeast in the dough.  Bilam HaRasha removed it from the dough, in order to present it as an independent issue, as having its own autonomous importance outside of human values.  Similar to this is the idolatry of "Molech."

    Judaism has been influenced by this curse of his,

 and thus has forgotten to return the yeast to the

dough, that is, to blend it into the larger, holistic matrix

of human relations.