Jewish Hope in an Age of Anxiety

New York’s Democratic primary results have left many American Jews deeply discouraged. It seemed that the more openly hostile a candidate was toward Israel—or toward the Jewish community—the easier the path to victory became. Friends in New York speak openly about whether they should leave for Israel or Florida. Social media is filled with anguished posts asking the same question: How can a city with such a large and historic Jewish population find itself facing the prospect of a mayor like Mamdani, alongside a broader wave of politicians who appear even more ideologically extreme?

Not long ago, Democratic Jews alarmed by the party’s increasingly anti-Israel rhetoric were often told that the Republican Party offered a clear alternative. You may disagree with parts of its policy platform, the argument went, but at least Republicans were not antisemitic, and they stood with Israel.

That reassurance is no longer so easily given. The political right is grappling with an antisemitism problem of its own. Tucker Carlson has increasingly echoed narratives favorable to Qatar, argued that Israel has long been the true source of instability in the Middle East, and hosted guests who portray Jews as uniquely troublesome while idealizing historical Muslim-Christian relations. Meanwhile, conspiracy theories have circulated online claiming that Israel was somehow responsible for Charlie Kirk’s death because he was allegedly about to reconsider his support for the Jewish state. Vice President J.D. Vance, too, has at times appeared reluctant to alienate antisemitic constituencies, speaking about Israel in ways that would once have been surprising for a senior American official.

None of this is easy to confront, and pretending otherwise serves little purpose. There is an old, dark Jewish joke that pessimists survived because they left Europe in time, while the optimists remained behind and perished in the Holocaust. Like many Jewish jokes, it captures something painful beneath the humor. Yet alongside a sober assessment of reality—and every effort to resist rising hostility toward Jews and Israel—it is worth remembering that Judaism has long understood hope somewhat differently from the modern world.

In contemporary psychology, hope is often described not as a passive feeling but as an active cognitive framework. C.R. Snyder’s influential Hope Theory defines it as a combination of three elements: clear goals, the ability to devise realistic pathways toward those goals, and the sense of agency needed to pursue them despite obstacles.

The Jewish tradition also places extraordinary value on hope, but it grounds that hope in a different source. Human beings are called to act responsibly and wisely, yet hope itself ultimately rests not on confidence in our own abilities but on trust in God.

The Book of Psalms repeatedly links hope with faith: “Hope in the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; hope in the Lord.” “O Israel, hope in the Lord from this time forth and forever.” “Let Your kindness, O Lord, be upon us, even as we have hoped in You.” In these verses, hope is neither wishful thinking nor optimism detached from reality. It is an orientation rooted in trust.

The Sages elevated hope to a central spiritual virtue. Midrash Rabbah teaches that redemption itself is bound up with waiting upon God, declaring that “everything depends on hope.” Even suffering, sanctification, and ultimate reward are described as being sustained through it.

Across centuries marked by exile, persecution, and repeated disappointments, Jewish thinkers continued to return to this idea. Writing in the eighteenth century, the Ramchal devoted an entire work to the subject, Ma'amar HaKivui (“The Essay of Hoping”). He suggested that the Hebrew word tikvah (hope) is related to kav (a line): the person who hopes stretches a line between earth and heaven, creating a connection that can sustain him even when circumstances seem bleak.

That perspective does not eliminate the need for political engagement or practical action. Nor does it ask us to ignore unpleasant realities. Rather, it offers a reminder that Jewish hope has never depended solely on favorable polling, sympathetic governments, or reassuring statistics. It has endured because it is anchored in something more enduring than any particular historical moment.

The prophet Isaiah expressed this idea memorably: “But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; they shall walk, and not faint.”

At moments when the future appears uncertain, that tradition of hope may be one of the Jewish people’s most valuable inheritances.