In Search of Sechel
An Ancient but Absent Jewish Concept
German was his native tongue and English his adopted language, but my father sometimes used Yiddish to make a point. This was especially true when it came to decision-making and problem-solving. For him, no dilemma was too difficult to solve if you used your Yiddishe kop, which he pronounced Yiddishe kopf, mixing Yiddish and German.
Literally, a “Jewish head,” Yiddishe kop refers to a particular way of thinking that involves analytical skills, mental agility, and resourcefulness. Think of it as street-smarts. In recognizing that diplomacy could not curb Iran’s nuclear ambitions, in developing a sweeping operation to upend those ambitions, and in successfully carrying out that operation over the 12-day war we just weathered, Israel demonstrated its collective Yiddishe kop. My father would have been proud.
Because a Yiddishe kop is innate (you either have one or you don’t), my Dad also preached the value of its cultivated corollary—sechel, a nuanced combination of intelligence, reason, and common sense. Sechel is what enables you to take a thoughtful, balanced approach to life, and to take a step back from knotty situations. A Yiddishe kop will tell you when you need to act, but sechel will keep you from going too far. Israel can rely on its Yiddishe kop to know when to enter a war, but needs to exercise sechel to know when to exit.
Alas, for all the Yiddishe kop-ness we displayed during “Operation Rising Lion” in Iran, our sechel is indiscernible in Gaza. Our government clings to the fantastical notion of surrender, while Hamas clings to power. A plan for Gaza’s governance appears non-existent, while Gazans’ suffering seems interminable. Our 50 hostages, 20 presumed living and 30 dead, are still in captivity more than 20 months since they were abducted. Soldiers are injured or killed on a regular basis. (The day after the Israel–Iran ceasefire was announced, we learned that a Hamas operative had bombed an armored vehicle, killing seven soldiers and bringing the tally of fallen IDF soldiers in Gaza to 440.) Sechel is precisely what we need now—not only to end the war in Gaza, but to build regional stability through the expansion of the Abraham Accords, to rebuild our over-burdened, war-weary society, and to vote out of office a brilliant war leader unwilling to work toward social equality and incapable of making peace.
Fortunately, sechel is a term derived from the ancient Hebrew. It appears in the Bible and in Talmudic literature and is used colloquially in Israel. It is a word within our rhetorical reach, even if it is beyond our current leaders’.