A Time for Peace and a Time for War

Derech Eretz, Truth, and the Moral Responsibility of Power

A Policy Essay for World Leaders

MNGlobal.org – Sanhedrin Initiative

“To Everything There Is a Season”

King Solomon writes:

“To everything there is a season,

and a time for every purpose under Heaven…

A time for peace, and a time for war.”

(קהלת / Ecclesiastes 3)

This verse is not poetic decoration. It is policy guidance.

The Torah does not sanctify war, nor does it demand naïve pacifism.

It insists on discernment.

Knowing which time you are in is the burden of leadership.

At this moment in history, two issues stand before the President of the United States and the global community, demanding radically different responses:

• Greenland: a time for peace, manners, and truth

• Iran: a time when moral restraint itself demands decisive action

Confusing these two is not strength. It is moral blindness.

Derech Eretz Comes First, Then Truth

The sages teach a principle so fundamental that it precedes revelation itself:

Derech eretz kadma laTorah

“Manners precede Torah.” (Vayikra Rabbah)

This is not etiquette. It is ontology.

You may be right, but if you behave without manners, you will still be wrong in the eyes of Heaven.

A simple analogy:

You may be correct in an argument with a police officer. But if you act with disrespect, you will be detained—not for being wrong, but for violating derech eretz.

The Torah recognizes two layers of moral failure:

1. Falsehood

2. Truth expressed without dignity

Both are destructive.

Greenland: Peace Requires Both Manners and Truth

We state clearly and honestly:

We are not privy to the inner strategic or economic discussions surrounding Greenland. We do not claim secret knowledge, nor do we speculate on classified considerations.

What we do know is this:

According to Torah, land is never legitimately acquired by force, except under conditions of clear self-defense or divine mandate expressed through prophetic or judicial authority.

When Yehoshua bin Nun entered the Land of Israel, it was not conquest-as-usual. It was a divinely adjudicated allocation, carried out with moral constraints, warnings, and accountability.

We addressed this framework in detail in a prior MN Global article on borders and Torah law.

Greenland is not such a case.

Denmark is a sovereign nation with:

• A functioning legal system

• Relatively low corruption

• A historical moral record, including the rescue of Jews during World War II

• A reputation as a responsible international actor

When dealing with such a nation, both derech eretz and Torah truth apply simultaneously.

Even if one believes a strategic destiny exists, destiny pursued without dignity becomes desecration.

To take land by force, intimidation, or humiliation—where no existential threat exists—is a chilul Hashem, a desecration of the Divine Name.

Peace here is not weakness.

It is precision.

Truth Without Manners Is Still False

The Torah is not impressed by correct conclusions reached through corrupt behavior.

If Greenland is ever to change hands—economically, administratively, or otherwise—it must be done:

• Transparently

• Voluntarily

• Lawfully

• With respect for human dignity

Anything less poisons the outcome before it begins.

This is a time for peace.

Iran: When Manners Alone Become Cruelty

Iran is different.

Radically different.

Here, restraint without action does not preserve life—it extends suffering.

We state this with care and clarity:

The Iranian people are not the enemy.

The regime that rules them is.

For decades, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and its ruling ideology have:

• Suppressed their own population

• Exported violence regionally and globally

• Openly called for the destruction of Israel

• Repeatedly declared hostility toward the United States

• Funded and armed proxy wars that devastate civilians

A regime that openly prays for annihilation forfeits the moral protections of sovereignty.

This is not vengeance.

It is consequence.

When Delay Becomes a Sin

Judaism recognizes a category of wrongdoing that is rarely discussed in politics:

Passive cruelty.

To tell a suffering population “help is coming,” while endlessly postponing action as bodies accumulate, is itself a grave transgression.

Time matters.

Prolonged inaction in the face of systemic brutality is not neutrality. It is complicity.

The Mitzvot at Stake

Toppling a murderous dictatorship is not a political act alone. It intersects directly with core Torah obligations:

• Pikuach nefesh – saving lives overrides nearly all commandments

• Pidyon shvuyim – freeing captives is a supreme mitzvah

• Erasing Amalek (conceptually) – confronting genocidal ideology, not ethnicity

• Feeding the poor – regimes that hoard wealth while their people starve violate this daily

• Protecting the widow, orphan, and stranger – those crushed first by tyranny

• Seeking peace – not the silence of fear, but the quiet that follows justice

Removing a regime that survives through terror is not war for glory.

It is surgery to stop systemic bleeding.

The Head of the Snake

It is remembered among Chassidim—and recorded in numerous talks—that the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, repeatedly identified Iran's (radical government) as “the head of the snake.”

The meaning was never casual.

A snake can be struck at the tail endlessly.

Nothing changes.

Address the head, and the body collapses.

History has been slow—painfully slow—to catch up with this insight.

President Trump and his family have shown deep and public respect for the Rebbe:

• Visiting his resting place

• Honoring Jewish life openly

• Hosting meaningful Jewish celebrations in the White House

• Demonstrating long-standing familiarity with the Jewish community from New York

This matters—not symbolically, but morally.

Respect for wisdom creates responsibility to hear it.

America Has Been Here Before

The United States was blessed for standing against Nazi Germany—not because war is holy, but because unchecked evil metastasizes.

History remembers that moment clearly.

This is another such moment.

Crushing a radical apparatus that thrives on death and intimidation would not only free Iranians—it would reconfigure the Middle East.

A New Middle East: First Imagination, Then Reality

Peace does not begin with treaties.

It begins with imagination.

If the IRGC’s grip were broken:

• Regional proxy wars would collapse

• Economic cooperation would replace fear

• The Abraham Accords could evolve from agreements into lived reality

The prophets described this era vividly: Nations traveling, knowledge flowing, swords becoming tools of cultivation.

One can imagine—without fantasy—railways connecting once-unthinkable destinations. Trade replacing terror. Pilgrimage replacing militancy.

This is not utopia.

It is post-trauma recovery.

Free Choice, Moral Urgency

This article issues no commands.

Judaism rejects coercion of conscience.

Leaders choose. Nations choose. History responds.

But time is not neutral.

Every day of delay has a cost measured in human lives and shattered families.

To hesitate endlessly while claiming moral concern is not humility—it is avoidance.

Conclusion: Heavy Rain, Then Gentle Dew

There are moments when rain must fall hard, washing away rot.

And then, quietly, dew settles—soft, life-giving, restorative.

Greenland calls for dew.

Iran calls for rain.

Confusing the two dishonors both peace and justice.

May those entrusted with power merit the clarity to know the difference.

And may the day soon arrive when the world no longer needs to ask whether it is time for war—because justice will have made peace possible.

MNGlobal.org

Sanhedrin Initiative

Rabbi Yosef Edery

Policy, Justice, and Moral Governance