What is inside the home of a country’s supreme leader?
Would the house be designed and built like a palace, an imperial residence or a European castle?
Would the interior display rhino horns, elephant ivory, tiger skins or… dinosaur fossils?
Would there be a huge glass cabinet displaying exceptional wines with centuries of history?
Or would the entire interior have to be dazzlingly gilded? Only then would it be impressive enough to welcome guests!
All I could find at the home of David Ben Gurion, a founding father and the first prime minister of modern Israel, was a small house with… Books, so many books.
There are more than 20,000 books in this house!
And there were absolutely no symbols of power + wealth present.
That is “someone else's prime minister.” I also hope to leave behind a lively collection of books like that at the end of my life. Keep going — 1/10 of the way there.
Actually, during his lifetime, David Ben Gurion strongly believed in both Socialism and Communism. And he wanted Israel to follow that path. Ideals are always beautiful. You have to look at the results to recognize the truth. When he died, he had 3 wishes. 1 was for his house to be like a Public Library—people could visit, borrow any book to read, and then return it.
They fulfilled the other wishes but not his wish for a ‘Public Library.’ Just as Israel became a capitalist country, not a socialist one!
Do not follow blindly. Correct the mistakes of former leaders based on what best serves your people. Deify no one; understand that great leaders can make great mistakes. Converse with history. Respect the truth.
A great nation keeps its great leaders in its heart, while its mind must think about the present and future of its entire people.
TMT
