Letters to the Editor II
Aside from various comments and feedback to the debate between R. Shulman and R. Goldstein, I received two insightful letters which I’d like to share. The first, by Dovid Gottesman, was also published in the Jewish Link of NJ. Importantly, in his original letter, though, he references Rav Chaim Brisker, not Rav Yisrael Salanter as the Jewish Link changed it to. As you’ll see, this makes a significant difference to the contrast he draws.
Apologetics only kick the can down the road
Editor:
I do not plan to directly engage with the sources R. David Shulman brought up in his recent article about charedim and army service. I assume that the esteemed readers were aware of at least the basic outline of these sugyas, and that, contrary to what the author set out to do, nothing was really cleared up for anyone.
This article would make R’ Zecharia ben Avkulus blush, and that is not a comparison I make lightly. For those unfamiliar with the reference, it is in the gemaras on the churban in Gittin, in the Kamtza/Bar Kamtza story, when the chachamim were faced with a tough halachic question. R’ Zechariah offered arguments against multiple courses of action, and in the end, nothing was done. R’ Yochanan Ben Zakai, in a very harsh indictment, blames R’ Zecharia's humility for the churban. I see churban around me and limud al menas lo laasos from this article.
The author (and other haredi apologists) seem to have two methods of defense:
1) What I newly call the "brisker method of hashkafa", which says that there are a lot of opinions on how to deal with a hashkafic question, and it's very hard for us to decide how to answer, so we might have to default into inaction. Making the question more difficult is that these questions were not sufficiently dealt with in previous generations. I find this brisker method in harsh contrast with R’ Chaim Brisker, who famously ran into the dangerously contagious cholera plague to save lives because he was so machmir in pikuach nefesh.
I don't actually want to engage with the sources because I know that these sugyas are relatively underdeveloped; because the Jews were in exile for so long, topics relating to communal responsibility were usually less relevant. (Please don't mistake this for not respecting the Torah, I have heard and learned all these sugyas and questions before. The author was not shedding any light to me.) Now that the Jews have their own sovereignty, these issues are back in full force, and they require deliberation and psak. But this is something that the hareidim refuse to engage with for one reason or another.
The Dati Leumi world, on the other hand, at least makes attempts. Sometimes, I hear the argument that the army does not have rabbis involved in making the military decisions, so they don't want to join. Did you know that R. Shlomo Goren wrote responsa on many tactical military decisions made by the IDF? Where are these tshuvas from the haredim? I don't think they are interested in reaching real conclusions in this.
2) The author notes that even if we could decide on a course of action, the devil is in the details, and executing this course would be hard and bumpy. To this, all I can say is that the Torah doesn't change, these sugyas had the same conclusion before the war, and the status quo was unacceptable then as well. Only now, we are suffering much more because of it. If the haredim were genuinely interested in the details and actually fixing the problem, why did they drag their feet for so long? For a community that prides itself on its commitment to its values, I find them sorely lacking in this area. I had a minor back-and-forth with the author in the comments of the original article on Chaim Goldberg's substack. He gave the impression that he would personally be unhappy if the status quo remained unchanged a few years down the road. That's very good and nice, but his article and the arguments behind it run interference for those who would be just as comfortable not acting (see point 1).
The author, throughout the article, seems very interested in establishing which points the dati leumi world should/would agree to, so allow me to tell you how a significant part of the dati leumi world (indeed, Israelis at large) is feeling. Why are there fathers of 4, 5, 6 children in Lebanon? Why are they getting called up for their third round of reserve duty in a year? (Please believe us, we are not interested in persecuting the hareidim. Nowadays, the zeitgeist places more emphasis on individual expression.) We tried reasoning with the hareidim, but they seem totally uninterested, so we have come to view them as an infected limb. We want them to get better, they are part of our body, but what can we do? We might have to go to the original status quo where yeshivos didn't get massive government funding, as was the case until the late 1970s (and yet Hashem still gave us miraculous victories in 1948 & 1967).
We do not have the time anymore to try to reason with them. They need to get their own house in order. So please spare me these articles that belong to a shana alef hashkafa shiur on October 6.
Dovid Gottesman,
Harish, Israel
Lest the Tribe of Issachar withdraw from the Children of Israel
Editor:
Within the discussion of Haredi participation in the IDF, I have noticed that many Haredi apologetics (like R. David Shulman in his article a few weeks ago, "Insight into the Mind of a Haredi") have focused on a wide variety of minutiae surrounding issues like halachic obligations towards communal safety and the stature of the largely secular modern Israeli state.
On a personal level I have found this genre of explanations overly technocratic while leaving what I view as the biggest issue unaddressed. At the risk of hyperbolics, I fear that we are seeing no less then the withdrawal of the tribe of Issachar from Klal Yisrael, with potentially disastrous consequences for both the Israeli Haredi community and the rest of the Jewish People.
Since Simchat Torah 5774, there has been a booming voice throughout the land of "מי לה' אלי" and Israeli Haredi Jewry has been deaf to the call. Army or not, the lack of a strong and persistent outpouring of communal commitment and emotion seems to indicate of a lack of sincerity in השתתפות בגורל. Prior to discussing the complex issue of Haredi participation in the army, I’m dumbfounded at the lack of Haredi participation within the Daled Amot of the Haredi world. Where are round-the-clock learning Sedarim? Mishmarot (in the literal form, of learning) on weekends and Chagim? Emergency Yeshiva and Kollel Sedarim over Bein Hazmanim? Woman’s Tehilim rallies? Mass tefilot for the return of the hostages?
In the army we often use the expression "מטח מבצעי", which roughly translates into “battlefield alertness”. In the Dati Leumi world, you cannot escape it. Uniformed men are sighted in Shul or on the street. Community chesed programs are lining up to support families with fathers in Miluim (my wife and children included). Everyone knows someone. Everyone has a long list of the wounded for special prayers. Lehavdil M’Chaim L’Chaim, everyone has been to a shiva and has taken out their flag and stood in silence to pay their respects as the families of the fallen drove by.
Walking through most Haredi neighborhoods here, everything seems too normal. Certainly there have been some chessed initiatives from the Haredi community which are blessed, (though, unfortunately, many petered out after the first few months). Yet conversations, comfort levels and the overall cadence of communal life suggest an absence of any meaningful dosage of battlefield alertness and tension. From an outsider’s perspective, it seems that the Haredi world here almost does not view the war - the hostages, the incessant firing from Hezbollah, the threat from Iran, the hundreds of widows and orphans - as “its” problem but as “their” problem. The formation of Issachar is at danger of abdicating its place under the banner of Judah.
If the Israeli Haredi community truly believes in both its responsibility towards the rest of Am Yisrael as well as in the primacy and exclusivity of Torah, then at the very least, the response to the current climate should be a communal צו שמונה to double down on everything the Israeli Haredi community holds dear. There is no reason why this effort of Torah study and chessed should not be equivalent in its intensity to Dati Leumi participation in the security forces. Well before we discuss who, how, and when Haredi society should be drafting, the issue of sharing in the burden of a shared destiny must be solved. Lest the tribe of Issachar withdraw from the Children of Israel.
The author, who I know personally, would like to remain anonymous at least so long as Am Yisrael’s focus is on the safe return of the hostages, and there is no active battlefield.