An inspiring spiritual teacher

There is an affluent society that has grown, savagely, from within Israeli society, in spite of all the false claims associated with the outrage of the social protests. This group aims to get as close as possible to lust-filled Mount Olympus, where promises abound for the fulfillment of needs and unabated indulgence. Or in one word: more. More of everything: more cellular, more digital, more everything.

If we were living in an ideal world, the model for Israeli society to emulate would not be the upper echelons or the wealthy, but rather Shmuel Ben-Artzi, Sara Netanyahu's father, to whom we bid farewell on Friday after he passed away at age 97.

Shmuel Ben-Artzi was a soulful teacher who educated generations of students. Most of them still hold his memory close. He was also a writer, using words to revive vanished worlds. Thanks to his stories, the exotic lives of Jews in the Novardok Yeshiva in Poland before the flood, were reborn, as were the pilgrims who immigrated to agricultural communities in the pristine Sharon area in pre-state Israel.

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At age 90, Ben-Artzi began writing his memoirs, finally catching his momentum and channeling it into a romantic confessional. His writing is profound, penetrating and inexplicably connected to the emotions that coursed through a much more vigorous, 30-year-old Ben Artzi. Only a truly humbled, vital and spiritual person such as he would be able to undertake such a task. He was a man who lived according to his beliefs: humble to the end, he did not leave the Land of Israel from the moment he entered it and, even with the passing of time, stayed religious. He was also – and this complements his character – a vegetarian, like Rav Kook, the founder of Religious Zionism and the spiritual guide of Ben-Artzi's son, Hagai, now a professor of Talmud and Jewish thought.

Not only was he a model worth emulating, Shmuel Ben-Artzi was also a walking spiritual workshop; or more simply, a mega-model for emulation. If our society would live in the image of Shmuel Ben-Artzi, even if only a little, it would be enough.

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