Thursday, July 02, 2026
Elder of Ziyon
In the Preface to the book, Tzioni states three goals: to understand what makes America great, to identify what threatens that greatness today, and to lay out what faithfulness to the Founding Fathers' vision demands of us today.
What Makes America Great
The book's central argument rests on one concept: covenant.
Covenant is the specific kind of agreement that defines membership by what you accept rather than what you are. [p. 4]
America was the first nation to make acceptance of the covenant itself the explicit basis of national membership—open to anyone willing to accept its terms, regardless of race, religion, or origin. Other 18th-century nations worked differently: in France, emancipation was granted by the majority; in England, Jews held civil liberties but not full citizenship and could not hold public office); across Europe generally, the "Jewish Question" consumed public debate.
This makes accepting the covenant of US citizenship comparable to the covenant at Mount Sinai, which created Jewish identity. In both cases, identity flows from acceptance — meaning that leaving the covenant means losing the identity that was gained by joining it. Tellingly, when the Founders used the word "federal" to describe the new system of government, they drew it from the Latin foedus—covenant.
Tzioni is careful to note that this doesn't mean the Founders simply transplanted a Hebrew political model. They drew from many sources, including classical republicanism, common-law constitutionalism, and Lockean liberalism. The Hebrew political tradition contributed something more specific:
[T]he Hebrew political tradition gives you the structure by which a diverse people becomes something together that none of them was individually—bound not by shared identity but by shared obligation... [p. 24]
These shared obligations are embodied in the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the subsequent amendments.
What Threatens America's Greatness Today
Like the covenant at Mount Sinai, America's covenant immediately raises a difficult question:
How much uniformity does a covenant require, and how much difference can it tolerate?" [p. 17]
One measure of a society's health is how it handles its inevitable disputes—and not all disputes are alike. Tzioni introduces the Jewish legal tradition that distinguishes between machloket l'shem shamayim—argument for the sake of heaven—and sinat chinam—baseless hatred. In the former, the dispute is in pursuit of truth, with each side recognizing the other's legitimacy. In the latter, the opponent isn't someone you're arguing with—he is unworthy of participation. Healthy disputes, Tzioni writes, "treat disagreement as disagreement rather than as evidence of bad faith or malign intent." [p. 22]
Participants in an honest disagreement are willing to revise their views when the evidence contradicts them. They recognize that even settled certainties are provisional — and that you can't claim the covenant's protections, such as free speech, for yourself, while denying them to others.
Today, Tzioni argues, a clear example of sinat chinam is the refusal to accept being wrong—something especially prevalent in identity-based politics, where a position is rooted in who you are rather than what you think. Under those conditions, political defeat is perceived as an existential threat. The resulting hatred and divisiveness are visible throughout social media and public life.
This polarization extends to disputes over the covenant itself when it fails to deliver on its promises. A classic case arose in the 1960s:
The civil rights movement did not say America's founding was a lie and must be replaced. It said America's founding was real, its terms are binding and you are in breach of them. That is the most powerful form of moral argument available within a covenantal framework—and it is only available if the covenant is real. [p. 11]
Done properly, civil disobedience within the covenantal framework doesn't reject legal authority altogether — it breaks one specific law to challenge one specific injustice, then accepts the legal consequences. That act of acceptance itself acknowledges the framework's authority, even as it challenges it. It appeals to the covenant's terms and holds it to its own standards.
Tzioni contrasts this with today, where civil disobedience has deteriorated into outright defection, with claims of exemption from the process itself. Instead of arguing that a law violates the Constitution's own standards, we hear that the system itself is corrupt and is undeserving of allegiance.
On the other hand, the correct approach has a recurring precedent in Jewish history:
The Temple was rebuilt after the return from exile, and the covenant was renewed—at Moab before the entry into the land, at Shechem under Joshua, under Josiah when the forgotten Torah scroll was rediscovered, under Ezra and Nehemiah after the return from exile. Each renewal acknowledged breach. Each renewal restored rather than dissolved. [p. 21]
Violation of the covenant is inevitable. But that doesn't void it—it calls to renew it.
What Faithfulness to the Founders' Vision Demands of Us Today
To survive, a covenant must be transmitted to the next generation. Jews do this through study and ritual, but the clearest example is the Passover seder. The seder is more than a celebration or commemoration; it is an active renewal of the covenant: "In every generation, each person is obligated to see themselves as if they personally left Egypt."
America has no comparable rededication. There was a time when public readings of the Declaration of Independence on July 4 were common; not anymore. Today, the Fourth of July celebrates the past rather than renewing the obligations of the covenant.
Tzioni points out a key difference between America and Europe. In Europe, citizens participated in the state through their representatives, paying taxes and, in return, receiving protections and services. --whose relationship to the state was largely mediated through government-- There, citizens participated in the state through their representatives, paying taxes and receiving protections and services in return. In the US, Lincoln's phrase "of the people, by the people, for the people" was taken literally. Americans took on social problems themselves—through churches, civic organizations, businesses,charities, and local communities, rather than waiting for government action.
The French philosopher and diplomat Alexis de Tocqueville noted this in 1835, in his two-volume Democracy in America. In France, he observed, citizens looked to the government when they had a problem; in England, to a lord; in America, to their neighbors. Americans formed associations and voluntary groups to build roads, found schools, run hospitals, and organize charities — solving problems collectively rather than waiting on government to act. That instinct still shows up in the numbers. A 2023 AmeriCorps survey found that 28% of Americans — more than 75 million people — volunteered through formal organizations to help their communities, while 54% helped their neighbors informally. The harder question is whether Americans will extend that same care to fellow citizens whom they will never meet, scattered across the country. That's where dedication to the covenant has broken down.
Rededication doesn't have to be complicated — it can be as simple as reading the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution, or getting involved in your community.
As Americans mark the nation's 250th birthday, Tzioni argues that fireworks and parades are not enough. Anniversaries matter only if they renew the commitments that made the occasion worth celebrating in the first place. America's covenant, like the covenant at Sinai, cannot survive on inherited sentiment alone. Each generation must consciously choose to accept it anew.
Whether or not readers accept every aspect of Tzioni's argument about the Jewish roots of the American experiment, Reclaiming the Covenant offers a fresh and thought-provoking way to understand both America's extraordinary success and its current divisions. At a time when many see only reasons to abandon the American project, Tzioni makes the case that the nation's founding principles are not exhausted, but neglected. The task before Americans is not to replace the covenant, but to recover it, renew it, and once again make it their own.
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Reclaiming the Covenant on America's 250th (May 2026) "He's an Anti-Zionist Too!" cartoon book (December 2024) PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022) |
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