Living in the Land of Israel part 4

The Zionist call for a mass return to the Holy Land, was firmly rejected by nearly every European rabbi. To be sure, there were communities of Jews living in the Land since time immemorial, surviving mostly on charity provided by their brethren in the Diaspora. This was the core of the present day Hareidi community, which predated Zionism by several centuries. One rabbi who did support Herzl was Rabbi Yitzchak Yaacov Reines (1839-1915). He made no claims of a a religious, halachic need to live in Zion. In fact, he was enthusiastic about a British proposal to give the Jews Uganda. He believed that Jewish life in Europe was nearing its end. Jews needed somewhere to go. He supported Herzl, despite the latter's secularism. He founded a religious faction within the Zionist movement called "Mizrachi". "Mizrach" means "East", but this was also a contraction of the words "Merkaz Ruchani"; a spiritual center. He managed to temper, and even defeat, some of the proposals of factions that sought the total obliteration of Torah from Jewish life. A second, and  more far  reaching figure to come on the scene, was Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook (1865-1935). He believed that the secular, vehemently anti religious Zionist leaders were actually responding to a deep religious calling, that they themselves did not understand. Yes, he believed that it was a mitzvah to live in the Land. But beyond that, he believed that the Redemption had begun, and every Jew was called upon to come to the Land in order to help the Redemption along to greater and higher stages.Those who remain in the Diaspora are betraying the call of history. He is often painted as the ultimate inclusive, all-loving rabbi., This is primarily the result of a massive editing job by one of his students in the 1950s. His original, unedited works spoke of temporary tolerance, but wrote of a religious popular coup to follow independence. He also spoke with great revulsion about the Zionist leadership. However, he felt it necessary to work with them, in order to bring about the full Redemption. He actually developed a doctrine, previously unknown in Judaism, that we had entered an era of Great Mercy (Rachamim Rabbim), in which the observance of mitzvot was of only secondary importance. This concept is very close to the Pauline idea of Grace.  He was a hardliner on conversion, urging rabbis to avoid participation, as every sin of the new convert was on the heads of the rabbis who converted him. He immigrated to Ottoman Palestine in 1904. He spent World War I in Europe, accepting a rabbinic position in London. He returned to the Holy Land in 1919, where he occupied several major rabbinic positions, and opened his own Yeshivah. His many writings spanned the areas of halachah, philosophy and Kabbalah. but the persistent themes in his writings were the uniqueness of the Jewish people, and G-d's imminent redemption of His people and His Land, already underway. Many of his rabbinic colleagues were scandalized by his ideas. The illustrious Rabbi Yosef Chaim Sonnefeld (1848-1932) remarked "Rav Kook's great love of Zion, has taken him out of his mind, and away from the mind of his Creator". Rav Kook worked tirelessly within the Zionist communal structures for recognition of a religious meaning to Jewish life. This is especially evident in his hard-fought battle for the establishment of an official Chief Rabbinate for the Jewish community, with rabbis in every town working under its aegis. He died well before the independence of Israel, but virtually all government rabbis ever since have been his students and student's students. They are the backbone of religious Zionism ever since. His supporters see in these efforts his great foresight in keeping the country Jewish. His detractors see this as a fig leaf for an essentially anti-Torah and anti-G-d political entity. Some see him as almost a Prophet. Some see him as delusional. Where one stands on this question, will greatly influence his approach to the "obligation" of aliyah, to a country where fully one-third of the people, seek the annihilation of the Torah way of life, and in extreme cases, the annihilation of Torah observant people. (A bumper sticker often seen during my last years in Israel read "Dros kol dos, hashmed kol chared"; run over every Orthodox person, destroy every ultra-Orthodox person) But the followers of Rav Kook's ideology insist that these are all stages in the Redemption that must not be interfered with or opposed. A student of a student of Rav Kook, very prominent in Israel today, said that the Palestinian Authority and its soldiers must be given great respect, as they exist by virtue of an agreement with the State, and are therefore part of the process of Redemption... Each side in this debate sees the other side as completely delusional, blind to the reality of what is happening. May HaShem enlighten us!

Living in the Land of Israel part 3

Every Torah Jew has a deep love for the Land of Israel. Whereas some saw Zionism as the fulfillment of the prophecies of Redemption (to be dealt with in more depth in my next post), others saw it, and continue to see it, as a sinister force of not only secularism, but of rebellion against G-d. It is important to remember that the founder of Zionism, Theodore Herzl, was an assimilated Jew, who became aware of the dangers of Jews remaining in European society during France's infamous Dreyfus Affair, that lasted from 1894 to 1906.. France had just lost a war with Prussia and a Jewish officer was made the scapegoat. Mobs ran through the streets of Paris, shouting "Death to the Jews". Herzl was terrified. If it could happen in France, it could happen anywhere. He published a proposal, that at a particular hour, on a particular day, all Jews around the world, led by their rabbis, must present themselves at their local churches for Baptism, thus ending the "Jewish Problem". When his proposal was met with great opposition, he instead took the stance  of a separate Jewish State. Herzl was a man of practicality, but not of ideology. He proposed a Jewish homeland, to be totally secular and Western, with German as its language. Nothing special. The real ideologue of Zionism was his follower, Max Nordeau. (Every major Israeli city has a Nordeau street or avenue). Nordeau reasoned that the Jewish religion was originally designed to unite the people. Today, religion divides people, and should be done away with. What unites people today (on the eve of world War I) is nationalism. The Jews must have a State to unite them, which would take the place of their "Ancient Religion". The ideas of Nordeau, combined with Socialist ideas, were the moving force behind the founding of the Zionist movement, the State, and still drive most secular Zionists. Nearly every European rabbi vehemently opposed the new movement. Rabbi Sholem Dov Ber Schneerson, the Fifth Lubavitcher Rebbe, wrote a famous letter in which he declared Zionism to be "worse than Christianity", in that the latter at least believes in G-d. Rabbi Joel Teitelbaum, the Satmar Rabbi, gave this opposition a theological base. This basis is the Three Oaths:

To what to these three oaths refer? One, that Israel should not go up as a wall. One, that the Holy One, blessed is He, made Israel swear not to rebel against the nations of the world. One, that the Holy One, blessed is He, made the gentiles swear not to subjugate Israel too much. (Ketubot 111a)


Whereas some rabbis, sympathetic to the Zionist movement, argued that the Oaths no longer applied, either because the Balfour declaration meant that the Nations had presented us with the Land of Israel as a gift, so that we are not rebelling, or, alternatively, that the Nations had not fulfilled their Oath of not subjugating us 'too much", thereby relieving us of our Oaths as well,  the fact is that this entire line of reasoning is a red herring. First of all, the above Talmudic passage is aggadah (legend or allegory), not halachah. It had never, in almost two thousand years, been quoted in any halachic work Who made these oaths? When" Where? Why are they not recorded in any works of history, Jewish or non-Jewish?  Rather, the Satmar Rebbe feared Jews being drawn to a secular, anti-religious State, stripped of their Faith and Identity. A more minor Hasidic rebbe quoted him as agreeing that this was his intent. But the issue of the Oaths remains a cornerstone in the Hareidi opposition to Zionism. Zionism is not only the submission of Jews to a hostile, secular entity, but is actually the breaking of a Sacred Divine Oath. As the Nazis were taking over Europe, and the British had closed the gates of the Land of Israel, some nevertheless obtained visas. Some European rabbis urged these people to better face death under the Nazis, than spiritual annihilation under Zionism. What a horrible dilemma. Where these rabbis right, or horribly wrong? In my next post, I will deal with the small group of rabbis who totally favored Zionism, and saw emigration to the Holy Land as not only a practical necessity, but as a religious one as well.