tyranny, Pirke Avot and Iraq
President Bush's inauguration address boldly came out against tyranny- no surprises there. Indeed, some people seem to think of "tyranny" as the all-purpose argument stopper (as in, "I'm for the war in Iraq because Sadaam Hussein was a tyrant.")

But common sense suggests a more nuanced position. In Pirkei Avot, a book of aphorisms by rabbinic sages written in Israel during the late Roman Empire (2nd century C.E., maybe a bit later), Rabbi Chanina is quoted as follows:

"Pray for the welfare of the government, for without fear of governmental authorities people would swallow each other alive." (Avot 3:2).

Chanina was not speaking about a tidy little democracy, or even a garden-variety benevolent dictatorship. Chanina's "government" was the Roman Empire, a dictatorship which had killed hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of Jews, while putting down various rebellions - in other words, a government not all that much different from Sadaam Hussein's.

In other words, Chanina was saying: EVEN IF the government is murderous and tyrannical, pray for it, because a tyrannical government is generally far better than none at all.

And I agree with this view: in a garden-variety tyranny, I am free to do anything but criticize the government. But where there is no government, or where the government is too weak to establish order (e.g. some of America's more dangerous neighborhoods), I can get killed just for minding my own business.

Of course, there are some limits to that principle: a government that randomly kills people (e.g. the Khmer Rouge), or one that kills people who do nothing to offend it, is no better than anarchy.

But the Roman Empire was not such a government. If rebelled against, the Empire responded with indiscriminate savagery- but if left alone, the Empire left you alone. Most modern tyrannies (even, I suspect, Sadaam Hussein's) probably resemble the Roman Empire more than the Khmer Rouge. The logical implication of Chanina's view is that even a Sadaam Hussein-type government should be prayed for if there is no alternative government out there.

By contrast, if there is no order in Iraq, the Iraqis are left with a situation where people "swallow each other alive" - a situation worse than tyranny, according to Rabbi Chanina (and me).

(Caveat: I don't know enough about the situation to know to what extent this is the case, or whether the situation is likely to improve as long as American forces remain on the ground).