Israel

Was Their Faith in Redemption a Mistake?

The crisis of Gaza uprooted thousands of Jews from their homes and businesses. Was their faith in Redemption also uprooted? Time will tell.

Years ago, I went on New York City radio to argue with the disciples of Rabbi Mayer Kahana z"l, who taught if we only had faith we could do many things. I taught that faith has its limits, although it surely is a primal religious value. Those who would urge people to risk their lives and have faith, I argued, are doing what the Biryonim of the Second Temple did. They incited the Jews against the Romans, and promised them heavenly salvation. Those who believed this ended up as Roman slaves or dead.

The rabbis opposed the Biryonim, and only with the greatest of efforts did they save something from the Roman destruction. We should have learned our lesson. We are in exile. Those who promise glory and salvation for those willing to brandish a sword against Rome have long perished. If someone wants to rekindle this belief, we must oppose it.

Since I spoke these thoughts on New York City radio many years ago, tragedies I predicted have come to be. Rabbi Kahana and his son are dead. Their faith was pure and holy, but they are dead. We are in exile, whether we want to have faith and escape it, or not. These are bitter words, but sometimes, it is better to say bitter words than to die and encourage others to die.

Those uprooted from Gaza who find a crisis of faith in Redemption can recognize their mistake, and utilize their newfound appreciation of the exile to prepare properly for the Redemption, however that can be done. Or else, they can plunge anew into radical and dangerous maneuvers, whereby either their anticipated miracles will occur, or they will not.

Gaza transformed Israel. Nothing is more important to the student of the future of Israel. Gaza will restructure Israeli politics and Likud. Whether those expelled from their homes will lead Israel to new and positive political levels, or become radical, is yet to be seen.

Expelled or not, the demographic power of the right wing and the religious cannot be reversed. The demographic decline of the secular Zionist cannot be reversed. It is only a question of time before many of the ideals espoused by religious people will become part of the political process.

However, any radicalizing of the right will destroy it. In this is the hope of the secularists. If only they can torment the religious and the rightists in order to make them snap and thus restore secularism to its previous power. This must not happen.

A frustrated Redemption is not easily replaced with calm acceptance. Look what happened at Lubavitch. In Israel recently, I met someone in shull, and we began to chat. He explained to me that the Rebbe is alive. He had various arguments, but they required "twenty minutes." I told him that our Torah is simple and true, and doesn't need twenty minutes. Those who need twenty minutes have to invent things that are not in the Torah.

Keep things in perspective. Once you, without prophetic powers, decide that someone cannot make a mistake, you take him out of the mortal realm. You have no right to do that. The rebbe, with all of his holiness and genius, was as human as Moses, the Baal Shem, and the Baal HaTanyo. "אין צדיק בארץ אשר יעשה טוב ולא יחטא" applies to the Lubavitcher Rebbe zt"l and everyone else. Those, consumed with their faith, who refuse to accept reality, invent structures and status convenient for their beliefs. This is treife.

The same energies that took the rebbe above the mortal realm, could, with the slightest sleight of hand, make him divine, as has indeed happened. When will it stop? Let those who leave Gaza look at the disaster of those who invented a new faith out of a glorious Hassiduse, and tremble. Yes, Gaza was a destruction, but there are worse things.

Sharon and the Religious Community

The State of Israel has had many Prime Ministers in its short history. None of them are like Arik Sharon. He has produced more surprises than any of them. He has changed his own political posture more than any of them. And his legacy is more in doubt than the legacy of any of them.

Arik Sharon has damaged the interests of the religious community more than any other group of people. Herein lies the key to the entire political situation in Israel.

When we hear of politicians pushing their program and proclaiming various benefits and idealism, we must always be suspicious. Is there anything lurking underneath the clever phrases, the cogent reasoning?

In Israel, since its inception in 1948, the religious question has presented the state with a theocracy. The secularists were the majority, but they could not subdue the religious interests. Indeed, since the inception of the state, the theocracy of Israel has withstood all challenges from the secular majority, until Sharon.

Sharon destroyed the theocracy of Israel, with his partner, Tommy Lapid, whose party, Shinui, exists only to batter the ultra-Orthodox. Here and there are tatters of the theocracy, and the secular revolution is not complete, but the process is there.

There is a question about this. Why did the state maintain an Orthodox theocracy from 1948 until 2004, and then change its mind under Sharon? Logic would dictate that if the Orthodox lost power in 2004 after over five decades, their decline in voters was a factor. However, the opposite is true. The Orthodox have never been so powerful politically as they are today.

Fifty years ago the Orthodox were a quaint anachronism. Today, as the secular population declines, the Orthodox barrel forward. Demographically, the Orthodox have large birthrates, and the secularists have very lower birthrates. The Orthodox hold on to their children, and the secularists wave good-by as the children go to other countries. Hundreds of thousands of secular Israelis have become Orthodox in the last fifty years.

If so, why now, of all times, does the secular majority under Sharon destroy the religious power of the Orthodox and change Israel from a theocracy to a more secular state?

However, it is precisely because the Orthodox surge forward and are becoming more and more powerful in the army and every social institution that the secular majority is desperate to break them before the religious people gain complete control. Sharon and his partner Peres see their task as one of controlling the Orthodox. Indeed, this is the last chance for the secular majority to stop the Orthodox.

There is a strong suspicion that the slaying of Yitschok Rabin was done in order to discredit the Orthodox and destroy them. It didn't work because on the day of the assassination Rosenthal wrote about it in the Times, exposing the plot. Now the plotters had to abide their time, and find another excuse for their dirty work. Sharon and Peres are finishing the job begun with the murder of Rabin.

The Orthodox community has spirit, and it has numbers, growing numbers. All plots against them are simply desperate efforts doomed to failure.

We await Moshiach, but until then, HaShem will protect us against those who raise their hands against the Torah, and against our community.

These mountains are rich with the blood of our ancestors, slaughtered, dead in battles, and buried in peace. For thousands of years Jerusalem and Israel are holy for the Jewish people. We now seek holiness with peace, and the coming of the Moshiach Messiah. From these holy hills the prayers and struggles of those who live there inspire us. The prayers uttered here are special and heard in heaven. If you know anyone in Israel, now is the time to do the right thing. Show that you care.

The Three Weeks began on Thursday, July 17, with the Fast of the Seventeenth of Tamuz, and concludes with the Fast of the Ninth of Av, on August 7, 2003 . The Three Weeks is a time of mourning for the Destructions of Jewish history. We think of the past and its lessons for the present. We ponder the mistakes of our ancestors, and resolve not to repeat them. The Three Weeks and Jewish history teach us how to survive. They are our hope for the future.

The two fasts, of the Seventeenth of Tamuz and the Ninth of Av, represent two opposite problems and failings of the Jews. The bookmark fasts stand for fear and overconfidence. On the Seventeenth Day of Tamuz, the Jews failed because of fear. On the Ninth of Av, the Jews were destroyed because of overconfidence. The Three Weeks are known as “between the walls.” A Jew walks between two walls. If we are too afraid, we suffer. If we are too confident, we suffer. This is the lesson and the curse of the Three Weeks, and Jewish history.

We do not fast twice in three weeks just to remember history. We do it to protect our present and future from past mistakes. How are we doing today in this regard? Let us look into the past, and perhaps we will better understand our path for the future.

The Seventeenth of Tamuz is the day Moses broke the Tablets at Sinai because the Jews worshipped the Golden Calf. The Jews waited forty days for Moses to descend Mt. Sinai . There, Moses studied Torah with G-d. Finally, in fear of the future, the Jews despaired of Moses. They declared that Moses and the Jewish way of dealing with a great and fierce G-d was hopeless, and Israel needed a new deity. Although the Jews repented when Moses descended the mountain and they realized their mistake, much damage was done. Even today, we suffer because of the mistakes of our ancestors at Sinai. One of our problems is fear, the very thing that propelled the generation of the Desert to sin with paganism and to reject Jewish values.

The other end of bookends of the Three Weeks is the Fast of the Ninth of Av. The First and Second Temples were destroyed on this day. In both situations, the Jews rebelled against mighty kingdoms. The prophets in the First Temple and the rabbis in the Second Temple advised the Jews not to rebel. The Jews, however, were overconfident, defied the rabbis, and were exiled and destroyed. Thus, overconfidence has a mighty portion of our misery.

How can we proceed? If we fear, we perish. If we are overconfident, we face destruction. What should we do?

The fear that befell us was the fear that G-d deserted us. Of course, G-d did desert us many times, but not because He left us, but as a temporary punishment. When we have problems as Jews, we do not fear that the Torah is the wrong path. We do not seek a new idol every time we are frightened. Throughout Jewish history, various vicissitudes convinced frightened people to abandon the rabbinical program of faith in G-d and the Torah. They had no patience to wait until G-d shined His face upon us. They therefore left and made other arrangements. These people today are lost and their movements are destroyed. Those who had faith continue until today, and will always continue. In other words, we have no fear that G-d or destiny will desert us. We obey the Torah, and await G-d’s favor.

Overconfidence in defiance of the rabbis will not succeed. In the time of Moses, G-d told Jews they could not enter Canaan because of their sins. What did the Jews do? Many of them accepted this and mourned, but others refused to accept it. They declared, “We will show G-d how dedicated we are. When He sees us risk our lives, He will save us.” They charged from the desert into Canaan , and found destruction. So it was with those enflamed with Jewish pride in the times of the Temple . They said, “Can G-d just watch the Babylonians and Romans insult Jews in their own land? Will G-d not protect those who stand up to tyranny on the Holy Soil?” The prophets and rabbis warned against rebellion, but the militants refused to listen. Thus, destruction descended upon the Jewish people. The brave warriors who risked all became slaves.

The focus of the present is on the territories. Should Jews live in the territories? Should they turn over the territories to the Palestinians? Before we discuss this, we must mention another fact, revealed recently. Ariel Sharon, once the bulwark of those believing in settling the territories, the very one who proclaimed, “Seize every hilltop,” has now changed his mind. President Bush, once seen as a knight in armor protecting Israel against its enemies, is now working mightily to create a Palestinian state that cannot but end in mortal danger to Israel . The change of Sharon is rooted in the transformation of Bush. The transformation of Bush is rooted in the Exile. This is the key. Does G-d protect those in Israel who risk all for Jewish nationalism or the spirituality of the Holy Land ? Or do we, even when living in Israel , quake at the censure of the powerful nations?

The bookends of the Three Weeks, fear and overconfidence, inform the present debate. Some feel we must take the holy land from the Arabs, by settling areas where Arabs predominate and redeem the holy soil. Others say this will defy the nations and could bring destruction. The issue is complicated by other debates, such as how to create security, or if such a thing is possible. However, when we see different opinions and attitudes regarding the territories, we are really talking about the two ancient forces that create destruction. Are we, by settling in Arab areas, inciting the nations and thus showing the overconfidence that once destroyed the Temples ? Or are we, by desperate surrenders to the haters of Israel in Oslo and the Road Map, displaying a fear that is unwarranted and counterproductive?

Messianism plays a role in all of this, too, of course. Some of those who risk their lives daily in settlements follow the teachings of someone who felt that if we just risk our lives, G-d would save us. That person, surely a most dedicated and sincere individual, is dead, as is his son, and many others who followed his message.

Some tell us that Messiah is here already as we have the land. Others invoke signs and portents to forget the fear of the world and its censure.

The pot is boiling. The hate of Israel in Europe and elsewhere is exploding. One thing all intelligent people realize by now. There is no solution other than Messiah. However, in the past, such hopes fueled the foolishness that burnt two Temples . How we deal with the Two Fasts, fear and overconfidence, will determine, to a large degree, what our future will be. May HaShem have mercy on us. And those of us in the exile should surely do what we can to support those in Israel who suffer economically and emotionally from all that goes on. A senior rabbi in Israel , a disciple of the Satmer Rov zt”l, once told me, “The rebbe told us, ‘Messiah will come to Israel . There must be Jews there to welcome him.’” Speedily, in our time.