A Bible on the Moon

Stand for Israel  |  May 9, 2019

Each year on Israel’s Independence Day, Israel hosts the International Bible Quiz for Youth. This year, the event was graced by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who invoked the Bible when discussing Israel’s growth and development. The Times of Israel tells us how Netanyahu credited the Bible for his nation’s “initiative, determination, and daring,” while promising to deliver a copy of Scripture to the moon:

“Last month we felt tremendous excitement: the spacecraft Beresheet was a hand’s breadth from the moon,” Netanyahu said in his remarks at the Bible Quiz event in Jerusalem.

Noting that the lander carried a digital copy of the Bible, he announced, “that’s not enough…. We’re going to send the spacecraft again, and it’s very likely it will be carrying a small [printed] Bible. I want the Bible to land on the moon, because it is written [in Psalms 8:4], ‘When I behold Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars which You have established.’ The State of Israel will reach the moon…

“Very few nations have orbited the moon and reached the moon, and up to now only three superpowers landed there, and we want to be the fourth nation to do so. After all, the other nations were a bit bigger than us — the United States, China, Russia — and there is a very good chance that within two-three years we will be that fourth power.

“How do we do it?” he asked rhetorically. “We do it through initiative, determination and daring — given to us by our spirit. And our spirit comes from the Bible. That’s not just words. That spirit comes from the Bible, because there’s no meaning to the enormous journey we have made to return to our land, to our birthplace, if we had not carried with us our faith, our tradition and our yearning for the homeland.”