Transcript

Our attention is perennially focused on Eretz Yisrael and it was certainly the case today. I'm hoping that we can talk a little bit not about specific events or individuals but about issues. And the reason for framing the conversation that way is that A, that's always preferable. B, my knowledge of specific events and what individuals have or have not done or have or have not said is at best fragmentary and incomplete. And were I to speak about events and individuals, it's entirely possible, even likely, Rachmana litzlan, I would mischaracterize or misrepresent or misinterpret. Even if my knowledge of news reports was comprehensive, news reports also can be unintentionally or intentionally incomplete and lacking context. So I certainly won't be comprehensive in touching on all relevant issues. Again, because of my fragmentary knowledge and incomplete grasp, and v'itachen will mention some issues that are not germane. So no inferences should be drawn. And the final word of introduction is that some of the issues that we'll talk about, it's obviously much easier to dispassionately see and recognize from this side of the Atlantic than if one is living in the midst of everything that's going on. Is there a categorical absolute p'tur from serving in the army for Bnei Yeshiva? So the source that is bandied about is the concluding Halakha in Hilchos Shmitta v'Yovel where the Rambam writes

ולא שבט לוי בלבד אלא כל איש ואיש מכל באי העולם אשר נדבה רוחו אותו והבינו מדעו להיבדל לעמוד לפני השם לשרתו ולעבדו לדעה את השם והלך ישר כמו שעשהו האלוקים ופרק מעל צווארו עול החשבונות הרבים אשר ביקשו בני אדם הרי זה נתקדש קודש קדשים ויהי השם חלקו ונחלתו לעולם ולעולמי עולמים ויזכה לו בעולם הזה דבר המספיק לו כמו שזיכה לכהנים ללוויים.

So the Rambam seems to extend membership to Shevet Levi even for those who are not by lineage descended from Shevet Levi. And earlier the Rambam writes that in the previous Halakha that שבט לוי לא עורכין מלחמה כשאר ישראל. Reflects on the Rambam, kimedumeh that it's clear that that's not what it says here or that's not the application that the Rambam gives and intends. According to that reading of the Rambam, so the Rambam here is reflecting Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai in the famous machlokes in the beginning of the sixth perek in Brachos between Rabbi Yishmael and Rabbi Akiva and Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai that Rabbi Yishmael says

הנהג בהן מנהג דרך ארץ ורבי שמעון בר יוחאי אומר אפשר אדם חורש בשעת חרישה זורע בשעת זריעה קוצר בשעת קצירה וכו' תורה מה תהא עליה אלא בזמן שישראל עושין רצונו של מקום תורתן נעשית על ידי אחרים.

So ostensibly the Rambam here in Shemittah veYovel is reflecting the view of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, whereas in Hilchos Talmud Torah the Rambam unequivocally reflects the view of Rabbi Yishmael. But that would be very incongruous and very difficult to understand if halacha lema'aseh the Rambam thinks that a person has the is given the two options of whether to identify himself as a Rabbi Yishmael yid or as a Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai yid, then he should have told us that in Hilchos Talmud Torah. And when he writes in Hilchos Talmud Torah

מעלה גדולה למי שהוא מתפרנס ממעשי ידיו ומידת חסידים הראשונים היא,

he should have indicated that there's an exception, that there is an alternate track. And he doesn't. So we have to wait until we get all the way to the end of Hilchos Shemittah veYovel to find out that there's a second option, there's an alternate track. So it seems clear that the pshat in the Rambam is that the Rambam, kiyadu'a that where the Rambam in Mishneh Torah engages in divrei agaddah he does so at the end of halachos, at the end of Hilchos Mikva'os, at the end of Hilchos Me'ilah, at the end of Hilchos Temurah, at the end of Hilchos Issurei Mizbe'ach. He does it at the end. That's where the Rambam allows himself to share divrei agaddah u-machshava. The Rambam is describing here not something which is bedinei adam, a choice that a person makes, but something it's a hanhaga of Hakadosh Baruch Hu that Hakadosh Baruch Hu confers upon the person. Which is why the only nafka mina that the Rambam mentions, orchin milchama is a din bedinei adam. So the Rambam doesn't repeat that. What the Rambam repeats here is that

כל איש ואיש מכל באי עולם שנדבה רוחו אותו והבינו מדעו.

So what happens?

יהא השם חלקו ונחלתו ויזכה לו בעולם הזה דבר המספיק לו.

And when the Rambam says לא לשבט לוי בלבד, the most immediate antecedent was that הקדוש ברוך הוא זיכה להם שנאמר אני חלקך ונחלתך. So what the Rambam is saying in Hilchos Shemittah veYovel is not a din in dinei adam that affects mitzvos and chiyuvim bedinei adam. He's talking about a hashgacha of Hakadosh Baruch Hu. Hakadosh Baruch Hu sees that a person is נדבה רוחו אותו לעמוד לפני השם לשרתו ולאבדו, so Hakadosh Baruch Hu will orchestrate that that person is able to devote himself 100 percent. Harbe shluchim lamakom, someone will give him a birthday card, inside the birthday card is the lottery ticket, they'll win the lottery. Harbe shluchim lamakom, how's it going to happen? I don't know. But the Ribono Shel Olam knows. He's not talking about dinei adam. He's not talking about dinei adam. The Tzitz Eliezer has a very very important insight. He says if you look at the Rambam in Hilchos Shabbos Perek Beis Halacha Chof-Gimmel based on a sugya in Eiruvin, so the Rambam is writing about גוים שצרו על עיירות ישראל when Goyim lay siege and and there's a mortal threat to Jews. I'm skipping a few lines within the halacha.

מצוה על כל ישראל שיכולו לבוא ולעזור לאחיהם שבמצור ולהצילם מיד הגוים בשבת.

So the lashon Rambam is מצוה על כל ישראל. Says the Tzitz Eliezer what the Rambam means is that the p'tur of Shevet Levi is only when the only mechayev is milchama. Ein orach milchama. But when it's mitzad hatzalas harabbim, pikuach nefesh harabbim, so that p'tur, even the p'tur of actual Shevet Levi, doesn't apply. There is no categorical p'tur for Bnei Yeshiva. If if there's a surplus of manpower, how do you decide who, that's a different conversation. But but there's certainly no categorical p'tur. You know, when Chazal tell us that Torah is magein, that's a profound metaphysical truth. It's not a halachic dispensation. It's not said in that context. It's not applied in that context. It's a profound metaphysical truth and and reality, but it's not a halachic dispensation. It obviously goes without saying that that someone who rejects the position of a categorical p'tur is not questioning the supreme value of Talmud Torah. Not questioning the value of Talmud Torah. When the Gemara in Sanhedrin castigates someone who Rachmana litzlan says מאי אהנו לן רבנן, it means that he says, I understand the value of studying engineering, you'll build a bridge. But what's the value of learning? What does it do? What does it do? Someone who thinks correctly, but even if it were incorrect, it would be equally true, על אחת כמה וכמה if he thinks so correctly, that there's no categorical p'tur, that sometimes Talmud Torah, despite the fact that it's magein, yields to other chiyuvim. So that's a Yerushalmi in other contexts also. The Yerushalmi says Rabbi שמעון בר יוחאי וחבריו have to interrupt their learning to go sit in the Sukkah and to eat in the Sukkah and they have to interrupt their learning to to shake a Lulav. That's not questioning or Rachmana litzlan devaluing the value of Talmud Torah. The fact of תלמוד תורה כנגד כולם. doesn't disenfranchise the other six hundred and thirteen mitzvos. That's obviously not how the halachic system was designed by Hakadosh Baruch Hu. But it's crucial to recognize that there are two different and conceptually separate discussions, although they obviously have bearing on a similar situation. One is: is there a categorical p'tur? The other is: are there, is there an anti-religious culture that exists in the army that needs to be addressed in order to allow one to fulfill the mitzvah of serving in the army? There's a fundamental difference between those two factors, fundamental, fundamental difference between saying that that there's a categorical refusal as opposed to a conditional refusal. The first one preempts any, any attempt to find common ground. The second one allows to, to look for and hopefully find common ground. For Klal Yisrael to avoid catastrophic self-destructive behavior, so we need to know and we need to learn how to disagree, how to argue. כשם שפרצופיהם שונים כך דעותיהם שונים, as the same way no two people look exactly alike, no two people think exactly alike. In the same way, some people not only don't look exactly alike, but they look very different. So too, not only do some people not think exactly alike, but some people think very different. So disagreement is inevitable, argument is inevitable, so we need to know how to disagree and we need to know how to argue. The Rambam writes in Perek Vav of Hilchos De'os, Halacha Gimmel,

מצוה על כל אדם לאהוב כל אחד ואחד מישראל כגופו. כל אחד ואחד מישראל.

Two halachos later, Halacha Hei,

כל השונא אחד מישראל בלבו עובר בלא תעשה שנאמר לא תשנא את אחיך בלבבך.

My son commented that later at the end of הלכות רוצח ושמירת נפש, the Rambam quotes the Gemara in Pesachim where he writes

השונא שנאמר בתורה הוא מישראל לא מאומות העולם. כי תראה חמור שונאך רובץ תחת משאו.

The Torah speaks of you see the donkey of your enemy, of someone whom you hate.

והיכי יהיה לישראל שונא מישראל והכתוב אמר לא תשנא את אחיך בלבבך, אמרו חכמים כגון שראהו לבדו שעבר עבירה והתרו בו ולא חזר הרי זה מצוה לשנאו עד שיעשה תשובה ויחזור מרשעו.

So why didn't the Rambam tell us in Hilchos De'os that there's an exception? In Hilchos De'os, the Rambam... doesn't intimate that there's any exception. Aderaba, he formulates it in a way that makes clear that there don't seem to be any exceptions.

מצווה לאהוב כל אחד ואחד מישראל. כל השונא אחד מישראל בלבו,

so the Rambam says chutz, there is an exception which the Gemara in Pesachim recognizes in in the pasuk and the Rambam is going to codify later in Hilchos Rotzeach. So why doesn't he mention it here? And that's a very, very important ta'ana. So apparently what the Rambam tells us in הלכות רוצח ושמירת נפש is not an exception to what he says in Hilchos De'os. It's not an exception but they they they coexist. And that's why no, there is no exception to what he's saying here in in Hilchos De'os. What's the mashal? I don't know, imagine Rachmana litzlan you have a close relative, someone has a close relative, a child, a sibling, who's who has an addiction, I don't know, alcohol, drugs, whatever Rachmana litzlan it is. So you hate the addiction, you hate it. Maybe you even hate the person for being an addict, but you don't hate him or her in an unqualified sense, not if it's your brother, not if it's your child. You can hate an opinion, you can have two, you can have a parent and a child, you can have two two siblings, one's a fabrente MAGA, and one's a fabrente, what's the opposite, wokeist, I don't know what they are, whatever the correct political term should be. So you can hate, you can hate your brother, your sister's political views and and and probably do, probably do, and you can still love him and still not hate him. The lav of כל השונא אחד מישראל is in an unqualified sense. I hate him, I hate her. What the Rambam tells us in הלכות רוצח ושמירת נפש, the Torah doesn't say mitzvah in a in an unqualified sense. It's a paradigm for how how to disagree and and how to argue. And and it doesn't involve any weakening of of principle. Proof positive that we don't have the right balance, proof positive that the halacha of הלכות רוצח ושמירת נפש becomes an exception, which it's not, to Hilchos De'os is whenever we see the world, we see the Jewish world as an us versus them. If if that's how we we see the world, so then that means that we we haven't correctly integrated הלכות רוצח ושמירת נפש of mitzvah lissonos with Hilchos De'os of כל השונא אחד מישראל and מצווה לאהוב כל אחד ואחד מישראל. I mean very broadly speaking unless someone is mamash a moser or maybe a first generation min, maybe maybe under certain historical conditions which is motzi מוציא עצמו מן הכלל so it's it's never, never ever supposed to be us versus them when there's again not because the argument is eilu ve-eilu. No, in arguments which which one is convinced not eilu ve-eilu. In arguments where one is convinced that that the other position is is totally wrong and has no basis and has no justification, the Rambam in Retze’ach is not talking about an eilu ve-eilu. Some hold it's kosher, some hold it's pasul. No, that's that's no eilu ve-eilu in in that question and that's what he's talking about in Hilchos Retze’ach and it's not an exception to what he says in Hilchos De'os. Another guideline that that we absolutely must adhere to in in disagreeing, in arguing is to avoid false and and at times utterly reprehensible moral equivalences. No Jew should ever, ever and in most cases le-havdil the same thing is true in terms of non-Jews should be ever compared to a Nazi. Such a comparison is is a double travesty. It it defames the Jew and it cheapens the Holocaust. It cheapens the the the unspeakable atrocities and and barbarism and and cruelty of of the Nazis. It's an utterly reprehensible comparison. Nothing again speaking about reprehensible moral equivalences, nothing should be equated with being held hostage by by Hamas barbarians either. One can think and one can think correctly that something is wrong but that doesn't make it comparable to to to a hostage situation being held by by those sadistic evil Hamasniks. It's the same double travesty. The same double travesty. You know there is a famous story of the Beis Halevi, you all know it, that a woman comes to the Beis Halevi before Pesach and and and she has her sha’alah: can she use milk for dalet kosos? So the Beis Halevi asks one of the I don't know if it was a talmid or who it was, there were a few people around, to bring him a Shulchan Aruch. He opens the Shulchan Aruch and he thinks and deliberates for a while and then tells her no, I don't think so and then he hands her a sizeable sum of money and and wishes her a Chag Kasher V'sameach. So after she leaves they ask the Beis Halevi like what was that all about? A woman comes and she asks you a foolish sha’alah and you deliberate over it like it was a sha’alah of the agunos and then then you hand her a wad of of bills, what was that all about? So the Beis Halevi says if you don't take a sha’alah seriously people won't come back a second time and ask. And always, always a person should feel validated when coming to a rav to ask a sha’alah. What was the money about? He says this woman obviously didn't know that you can't fulfill dalet kosos with milk. She obviously didn't know that. But she does know that you don't drink milk after eating fleishigs. So if she she doesn't have enough money for the basic expenses. What the story illustrates, again, usually it's, I think, told to illustrate the Beis Halevi's genius. Okay, I'm certainly not contesting that. But that doesn't do too much for us, you know, you can't can't emulate, you know, whatever, you know, he has the gift, we don't, so what we're supposed to do with that, you know? But what what it illustrates, more importantly than his genius, is that whereas those around him heard, saw, and experienced this exchange from their vantage point, the Beis Halevi understood it and experienced it from the woman's vantage point as well. So ein hachi nami to be on the receiving end of that question was just a silly, ignorant question, that's all it was. So answer it and, you know, good night. And and the gadlus of the Beis Halevi was that sensitivity and that ability that he had cultivated to see the world from someone else's vantage point. Even amid profound disagreement. And again, a disagreement, not an elu v'elu disagreement. A disagreement where each side thinks the other one is absolutely wrong. Not elu v'elu, I have my opinion, you have your opinion. No, I think you're wrong, you think I'm wrong. Even amid profound disagreement, mutual understanding is possible, but it requires a concerted effort to see things from the vantage point of someone else. And and when one does that successfully, you know, mitzvah goreres mitzvah. When one does that successfully, so one can then become aware that, you know, even if my position is fundamentally correct, maybe there are things I'm doing which I now understand how they are viewed, how they register, how they impact the other one in a way that's that's wrong, in a way that's counterproductive. Kol zman that we're within our own bubble, within our own echo chamber, we won't recognize. A person can be fundamentally correct and still be making lots of mistakes. And and many of those mistakes will become apparent if we can see the world from someone else's vantage point. One or two last heros. Regardless of one's position on a ben yeshiva serving in the army, even if you think that everything I said at the outset is wrong, one has to have the utmost respect, appreciation, and hakaras hatov for the self-sacrifice of of those who do. The Ramban writes in the beginning of Parshas Vayishlach, why does the Torah recount the encounter between Yaakov and Esav and Yaakov's extensive preparations?

נכתבה הפרשה הזאת להודיע כי הציל הקדוש ברוך הוא את עבדו וגאלו מיד חזק ממנו.

So who does that hatzalah come from? Hakadosh Baruch Hu. He

הציל הקדוש ברוך הוא את עבדו וגאלו מיד חזק ממנו.

Vayishlach malach vayatzileihu. And then, toch kedei dibbur, literally, toch kedei dibbur, Ramban continues וללמדנו עוד שהוא לא בטח בצדקתו. He didn't rely on his own righteousness that things could play out on a supernatural level. And therefore והשתדל בהצלה בכל יכולתו. He exerted himself. Lehishtadel in rabbinic Hebrew doesn't just mean to try, it means to exert oneself.

והשתדל בכל בהצלה בכל יכולתו. ויש פה עוד רמז לדורות,

and there's a remez ledoros that the Torah is modeling for us here:

כי כל אשר אירע לאבינו עם עשו אחיו יארע לנו תמיד עם בני עשו וראוי לנו לאחוז בדרכו של צדיק שנתכונן לשלושת הדברים שהכין הוא את עצמו:

litfillah, ledoron, diplomacy, political activism, velehatzalah bederech milchama. Similarly, the Ramban has in Parshas Shoftim, when the Torah says on the one hand

כי תצא למלחמה על אויבך וראית סוס ורכב עם רב ממך לא תירא מהם,

there's no reason that you should fear an enemy who's more powerful, כי ה' אלהיך עמך המעלך מארץ מצרים. And the Meshech Chochma comes and he gives chizuk and he's mezarez. And then how does the, after all the zeirus, Hakadosh Baruch Hu is with you, don't worry about anything, al yerach levavchem. And then how does the Torah conclude? ופקדו שרי צבאות בראש העם. You appoint commanding officers to lead your army into battle. Says the Ramban כי התורה תצוה בדרך הארץ. Halacha functions on the natural plane. A belief in providence, in hashgacha, doesn't in halacha translate into passivity, into quietism.

כי התורה תצוה בדרך הארץ ותעשה הנסים עם יראיו בהסתר. ואין חפץ לפניו לשנות טבעו של עולם.

Hakadosh Baruch Hu does not like to perform nissim geluyim, which are exceptions to the functioning of nature because nature is itself retzon Hashem. So therefore Hakadosh Baruch Hu stipulates, yeah, I'll do the miracle for you, it will be providential, the hatzalah is going to be כי הציל הקדוש ברוך הוא את עבדו, but it's only going to happen when you act on the natural plane and do everything that's required on the natural plane. There has to be a Tzahal. Halacha mandates that there be a Tzahal. Those who serve in Tzahal, as we had so many, so many, so many reminders of these past two years, risk life and limb and incomparable mesirus nefesh, literal mesirus nefesh, and that needs to be recognized. It needs to be recognized, it needs to be appreciated, it needs to be esteemed, and there needs to be a hakaras hatov, there needs to be a profound sense of gratitude and indebtedness regardless of what one's opinion is on a halachic issue of bnei yeshiva service. There is a story about Rav Yisrael Salanter that when Darwin's Origin of Species was... was first published so there was an asifa of Gedolei Yisrael. And Rav Salanter said, you know, whatever you do, don't put out a cherem on the book. If you put out a cherem on the book, everyone's going to go out and read the book. So whatever you do, however the best way, the effective way is to counter this threat to emuna, that tactic will boomerang. You know, even if one thinks that it's wrong, absolutely wrong, unequivocally wrong that bnei yeshiva don't serve in the army. And even if one thinks, either because unfortunately one has not yet been zoche to the light of Torah, so one thinks about things in a secular vein that certain reactions, responses, are legitimate, it doesn't matter whether it's legitimate. It matters, the operative question, I mean, was it legitimate to put a cherem on the book? Yeah, it was certainly legitimate to put a cherem on the book. Rav Salanter was saying the operative question is you're looking to accomplish something. The operative question is, is it productive? So when thinking how one responds, the question is not, you know, can I justify my responding in such and such a way? The operative question is, will this response be productive? It's very hard to imagine, I think it's impossible to imagine that the impasse over bnei yeshiva serving in the army is going to be solved through arrests. It doesn't matter what one, which side of the issue one's on, the question is, is that going to practically, realistically, is that going to and therefore it doesn't make a difference, you don't even have to be dan on whether it's legitimate or not legitimate. I'm not even implying anything on that question. I'm not implying that it's legitimate. It's counterproductive. The operative question is not, you know, do I legitimately have a right to do this? The operative question is, am I going to accomplish, am I going to advance goals leshem shamayim in doing this? And maybe the final final perspective, and again, there could, I'm sure there are many other things, some of which I'm aware of, many of which I'm probably not aware of, that deserve to be discussed that I haven't discussed, maybe some things are really irrelevant. In a later, the first perek of Kesuvos, we'll have the sugya, be'ezras Hashem, of when if a person is, if a person's yichus is challenged, when his keeping silent is a shtika kehoda'ah and when it isn't. It's a shaila, when is in halacha, when do you say circumstantially that a person keeping quiet means that it indicates agreement, acquiescence, and when do you say no, he just kept quiet? If you call Shimon a mamzer and Shimon doesn't yell back at him, does that mean anything? What does that mean? Okay, so that's that's. But the question is a question that comes up in many other contexts as well. You know, when there are disagreements and arguments and profound disagreements and heated arguments and over existential issues, so you know there are actions and reactions and re-reactions and re-re-reactions and re-re-reactions etcetera. One can't protest against a reaction, even if the reaction is wrong and disproportionate, if one doesn't first protest against the provocation, if there was one which was also wrong. The mashal is you have two little children and one child grabs the toy that the other child is playing with. So the other child then hits the other kid over the head. So if the teacher, if the parent doesn't react to the provocation, so the teacher or parent cannot just react to the inappropriate, disproportionate, unacceptable reaction to the provocation. It is disproportionate, it is unacceptable, but if one reacts to the reaction and is silent about the provocation, so then that clearly indicates a shtika kehoda'ah, intended or unintended, a shtika kehoda'ah on the provocation. So selective macha'ah can imply distortions. You can't discipline the kid who hits without the kid first understanding that you recognize the provocation and that you're moche on the provocation and that you're telling child number two that אף על פי כן, your reaction to the provocation is unacceptable and disproportionate.