A shnorrer knocked on the door of the rich man’s house at six-thirty in the morning. The rich man cried, “How dare you wake me up so early?” “Listen,… - Leo Rosten

All of Judaism’s philosophy, ethics, ethos, learning, education, and hierarchy of values are saturated with a sense of, and heightened sensitivity to, rakhmones. God is often called the God of Mercy and Compassion: Adonai El Rakhum Ve-Khanum. The writings of the prophets are permeated with appeals for rakhmones, a divine attribute. (So, too, are the words of Jesus and the books of the New Testament.)

Writing after the Holocaust had destroyed a third of the world’s Jews, Yiddish poet Kadia Molodowsky (1894–1975) addressed the “Chosen People” doctrine most poignantly: “O God of Mercy,” she wrote, “For the time being / Choose another people.

The Talmud expresses this lovely thought: “God found the Jews as one finds grapes in the desert.