Neviim Tovim, blogs by Gillian Gould Lazarus

I’m never afraid when some keyboard warrior tells me that I am soon to die; for one thing, they are usually in the United States and I am in England. I do get annoyed that X Support doesn’t find it breaks their rules. If the person tells me that I will be gassed, because they are hoping for another Shoah, the algorithm probably does not identify ‘gassed’ as a threat. As for those who tell me my death is imminent, they may simply have noticed that I have three-quarters of a century behind me and decided that it’s even stevens that they are right.

The things I fear are different from anything which alarmed me in time gone by, such as nuclear bombs, flying or the London underground.

This is what I fear:

award ceremonies such as the Academy Awards or BAFTA.

arts festivals and music festivals

the Labour Party Conference

the TUC

doctors and teachers, particularly when they gather for policy making conferences

BBC News and Sky News

The Guardian and the Independent

Holocaust Memorial Day because the trolls get hyper-active

stand up comedians, apart from Yohay Sponder.

any festival or conference where the great and good are gathered together

As David Hirsh has said, we Zionists are excluded from the so-called ‘communities of the good’. How easily can we even drop into casual conversation the fact that we are Jewish? We are cautious.

In his first days at his Jewish secondary school, my grandson asked, ‘Who are those people?’ indicating the security guards. By now he will be accustomed, like all the children at the school, to the fact that the watchful guards are always in place, for their protection, just as they are always present at my synagogue.

My children used to have a song book, in which a famous quotation from Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav was set to music: ‘The whole world is a very narrow bridge, but the main thing is not to be afraid at all.’

כל העולם כולו
גשר צר מאוד
והעיקר, והעיקר
לא לפחד, לא לפחד כלל

The biggest fear is fear of the future -the auspices don’t look promising – but I suppose all fear is fear of the future as it is always orientated towards something which hasn’t yet happened.

We have a psalm which tells us: ‘You shall not be afraid of the terror by night, nor of the arrow that flies by day.’

לא תירא מפחד לילה מחת יעוף יומם

That’s Psalm 91. It doesn’t mean that we should be foolhardy, cross the road when the traffic light is green or refuse the covid vaccine when it’s offered, but it does encourage confidence.