An Obadiah Slope Column
Sure you can do something: The NSW Government says, “We are calling on people of all faiths and all communities across NSW, to come together in the wake of the terrorist attack at Bondi on Sunday, 14 December 2025, and help unite our state.” They ask us to perform “one mitzvah for Bondi.”
“In Jewish tradition, a Mitzvah is an act of kindness, compassion, and a moral responsibility. It is about taking practical action to help others, through simple, everyday acts of kindness that together create a powerful wave of goodwill. When these acts are carried out collectively, they strengthen the community and bring light in moments of darkness.
“This can be as simple as checking in on a neighbour, volunteering time, offering support to a local business, or donating to those in need.”
They suggest you describe your Mitzvah at https://www.nsw.gov.au/community-services/one-mitzvah-for-bondi But, perhaps many readers of this column will simply do it in secret.
An act of respect: At the official memorial on Wednesday night, Anglican Archbishop of Sydney, Kanishka Raffel, was first in the line of religious leaders lighting the fifteen candles honouring the Bondi victims, but stepped aside to allow the man next to him, the one with a security guard, to light the first candle. That man was Amir Maimon, the Israeli ambassador.
In the Great Synagogue: Archbishop Kaniaskha crossed Hyde Park from St Mary’s to the Great Synogogue, and made his contribution “I consider it a great privilege to be here with you in the Great Synagogue, this house of prayer and devotion. All the more so in this week when you have demonstrated your determination amid darkness to keep the light of Hanukkah shining.
“Today I bring you the sympathy, condolences, love and prayers of the Sydney Anglican community. I honour your dignity, your bravery, your compassion, and I express the friendship and solidarity of Sydney Anglicans with you.
“My Jewish friends tell me that when there are three Jews in a room, there are five opinions. The same can be said about Sydney Anglicans.
“But Sydney Anglicans speak with one voice when I say that we abhor antisemitism, and we will not turn away from antisemitism in silence.
“It is intolerable that over the last two and more years you have been terrorised in your homes, communities and synagogues. It is intolerable that you have to employ security guards for your places of worship, education and society, as though this was normal or acceptable.
“It is intolerable that the streets of Sydney have been filled with voices of threat and violence, and no one has silenced them.
“It is inexcusable that this week you are burying children, parents, survivors of the Shoah, Rabbis and community leaders.
“You deserve to be safe, respected and protected, not just because you are Jewish but because you are Australians. We stand with you in opposing violence and hatred, whether motivated from extremist religious, racial or political ideology.
“In your scriptures, and mine, the first words of God are, Let there be light. May the Light of the Lord God Almighty shine upon you and give you his peace.”
Down Station Street: For several months of 2025, Obadiah stayed in Station Street, Burwood, while visiting my sister Sylvia in hospital. So each day I would walk past Mount Scopus College, where armed guards and high walls protected the Jewish students. As far as I could tell, students could not walk to this school, could not be dropped off outside, and they all arrived by bus, it seemed.
And that was before Bondi.
Marching: In his callow youth, Obadiah marched in a couple of Vietnam Moratorium demonstrations. Yes, your columnist is really that old. What dredges up this memory of teenage enthusiasm, where, for a time, faith and other personal convictions caused Obadiah turmoil, is the question of Gaza demos of today. On the Moratorium marches, people shouted “Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Minh, Viet Cong are going to win,” which Obadiah could not join in with. Neither side of the conflict offered a good future for the Vietnamese people, it seemed to him. He figured the South had an awful government, and the North was Stalinist. He did not want Ho to win. But he did not want to be conscripted to go.
Anyway, the point is not to re-litigate that war, but the point out that there are extremists on every march.
But “globalise the intifada” is clearly an incitement to violence against Jews. So where’s clause 18c of the Racial Discrimination Act when you need it?
On a conservative Anglican website: “I have drafted and am submitting up the idea for a new lay militia order within the ACNA [Anglican Church in North America] charged with the protection of our churches and gatherings.” We can all get captured by our personal politics and bring them to church.
But Obadiah believes in the words of a hymn he sang in Sunday School;
“But we never can prove
The delights of His love,
Until all on the altar we lay…”
And that includes our politics, yes and prejudices. And so much else.
Spot the difference: Sandy Grant, Dean of Sydney, inviting people to St Andrews Cathedral: “If you don’t have a church of your own (or even if you do but there’s no mid-week carols), we’d love to welcome you to Sydney CBD’s home of classic Christianity for carols and lessons tonight, 7 pm.
“Doors open from about 6:30 pm. BYO water bottle and handheld fan.
“I can assure you we have thoroughly reviewed our security (no large bags or backpacks or luggage inside) and the Police are making regular patrols in the precinct.”
A prayer for this week: “Lighten our darkness, we beseech thee, O Lord; and by thy great mercy defend us from all perils and dangers of this night; for the love of thy only Son, our Saviour, Jesus Christ. Amen”