Kabbalah is the esoteric teachings of Judaism. So what does it have to do with Gaza and the Glock pistol?
Elements of kabbalah can be traced back to ancient times. It gained attention when a powerful summary of its teachings were rendered in writing in a book called the Zohar dating to the 13th Century. By the sixteen hundreds it was a widespread Jewish teaching and focused on the coming of the Messiah. The need for a Messiah was growing. Jews had been forcibly driven out of Spain and Portugal and were settling uneasily in Holland, Eastern Europe and many parts of the Arab world where life was difficult.
Into this milieu of social anxiety, ranging across thousands of miles, came one of the worlds greatest con artists. He came from a Jewish geographic sore spot that has festered for millennia: Gaza. Nathan of Gaza.
Nathan of Gaza saw the dire need for a Messiah. He found one and promoted him throughout the Jewish world with letters and travelling messengers. His messiah was Sabbatai Zevi. The Jewish world came unglued. The arrival of the messiah led to mass pilgrimages, Jews everywhere sold their homes, their businesses and abandoned their villages to walk to join the messiah.
The Turks were none to happy to have a messiah on their hands. To cope with a nearly hysterical Jewish world they put Sabbatai Zevi under house arrest and over the better part of a year they converted him to Islam. Brilliant tactic to subdue a messiah.
The elders of the Jewish world blamed the hysterical outbreak on kabbalah and thence forth admonished young scholars to avoid kabbalah studies until late in life and only under careful supervision. I myself was warned against kabbalah studies by several rabbis, when I was young.
Now to the Glock. I don't mean the specific handgun, the Glock, which is a fairly recently designed weapon. I mean all hand guns.
Kabbalah is dangerous to the society because it detaches the student from the rational world, the world we live in, the world we work in, the world we create families in. The world of commerce.
Everyone needs training and supervision in the use of handguns. 'Don't point the gun at anything but a target or the ground.' 'Don't point at a person with your finger in the trigger housing unless you are ready to kill them.' 'Keep the gun in a safe secure place and most of the time keep it unloaded and unchambered.'
Why does the Glock require training and supervision?
To make sure that the use and association of the person and the Glock occurs only in the rational world we live in. Training is designed to tie handgun possession to rationality and rational behavior.
The Kabbalah, Gaza and the Glock, parts of our world that we need to keep under rational control.