The forthcoming debate over an updated Tal Law – that defined the parameters for service by Haredim and others in the Israel Defense Forces – is liable to become heated and nasty. Mutual accusations will be hurled, with one group asserting that a demand for mandatory service is part of an ill-disguised war against Torah and the other side seeking an equal sharing of the defense burdens that fall on most other Israelis. The debate will feature arguments that are both somewhat compelling and somewhat misleading: that Torah study is the defining mitzvah in Jewish life, comparable to no other; that the IDF has a manpower surplus, not a manpower shortage; that it is unfair that some young men risk their lives for the safety of the Jewish people, while others sit in the comfortable confines of the Beit HaMidrash – and are supported (through government funds) by the families of those who are serving; that military service is often a prerequisite to entering the Israeli workforce and will resolve many of the financial struggles that beset Israel’s Haredim;  and that Haredi opt-outs from the military are a small percentage of the total number of Israeli youth not serving in the military, a number buttressed in recent years by hundreds, if not thousands, of secular Israelis (often from the Tel Aviv suburbs) who receive medical and/or psychological deferments from physicians all-too-willing to sign them.

    The proponents, both secular and religious, will struggle to distinguish between Israeli citizens who are Haredim whose service is compulsory, and Israeli citizens who are Arabs who – as Israeli citizens – should be just as required to defend their country but whose widespread service in the IDF would be problematic, to say the least.

    Undoubtedly, the dispute will become embroiled in coalition politics of the most sordid kind. Although the current government no longer needs the votes of the religious parties to survive, future governments surely will and the horse-trading involving prospective support will be typical and distasteful politics. The Torah itself will be unnecessarily dragged through the mud. While certainly Torah protects those who study and uphold it, it does not exempt the sick from seeking medical assistance, the hungry from eating food or the destitute from finding gainful employment. The Torah still demands that we live in reality – after all, the Torah is the book of the Source of ultimate reality –  and therefore not make national defense the only realm (if, indeed, it is the only realm) in which mystical considerations dominate our decision-making.

    Nonetheless, understood properly, this controversy affords a wonderful opportunity to re-define the terms of the debate in a way that can revolutionize Jewish life and restore the crown of glory as of old.

There have been many dramatic transformations that have occurred in the Jewish world since the re-establishment of the State of Israel. Obviously, the highlight is the regained Jewish sovereignty over the land of Israel for the first time in nineteen centuries and the reborn capacity and willingness of the Jewish people to provide for our own self-defense. But something else changed in the Jewish psyche – if not in the Jewish people itself: the renaissance of the scholar-warrior, what Rav Eliezer Shenvald, the distinguished Rosh Yeshiva of the Yeshivat Hesder Meir-Harel in Modiin, and Colonel in the IDF, called tzva’iyut and yeshivatiyut – the fusion of the military and the yeshiva. In the exile, we grew accustomed – even to think it natural and proper – that, in the language of the Talmud (Masechet Avoda Zara 17b)  “either the book (safra) or the sword (saifa),” but never both, and certainly not together.

     Not only is that wrong, but it is detrimental to the Jewish people.

     It was not always like that – in fact, it was never like that. The giants of our nation went to battle. Avraham went to war, Moshe himself went to war, David famously went to war. None of this was considered out-of-character or a concession to the times, but rather a natural part of serving Hashem. The Netziv wrote in his commentary to Shir Hashirim (4:2) that “your teeth are like the counted flock that has come up from the wash,” i.e., your teeth, that consumes anything before them, are the warriors who triumph in battle, who are pure, carefully- groomed, all righteous, meticulous even of their observance of simple mitzvot. It is the righteous who are supposed to lead the Jewish people into battle.

     Many justify prioritization of Torah study over military service by referencing Rabbi Elazar’s statement (cited by Rabbi Abahu) in Masechet Nedarim 32a that Avraham was punished and his descendants enslaved in Egypt because “he conscripted the Torah scholars” who lived with him when he went to battle against the four kings to rescue his nephew Lot. Besides the facts that this point is not cited as normative halacha by the Rambam or Shulchan Aruch, we generally avoid deriving normative halacha from Agadic statements, and there are other interpretations of that Gemara (Shitah Mekubetzet understands Avraham’s mistake as not rewarding them for their service), this opinion is even cited in the Gemara as a solitary view with which others disagreed. The Ralbag explained the verse as praising Avraham for taking with him into battle “chanichav yelidei beito,” those raised in his home and educated by him, saying that it is appropriate to take into battle only those “who were trained in Avraham’s ways and values since their youth.”

    In a similar context, Radak (Yehoshua 5:14) rejected the criticism of Yehoshua for abandoning his Torah study on the eve of battle as a “far-fetched exposition, for wartime is not a time for Torah study.” Indeed, Yaakov on his deathbed praised his sons Yehuda, Yissachar, Dan, Binyamin and Yosef for the martial abilities, however we wish to interpret his sublime words.

     Furthermore, Chazal underscored that King David’s fighters – Benayahu ben Yehoyada, Adino HaEtzni, and others – were the Sanhedrin, they were the Torah Sages of the generation. As the Gemara notes (Moed Katan 16b) in asserting that King David himself was called Adino HaEtzni, that he was adin, in Torah study he was supple and flexible like a worm, but in battle he was an etz, hardened like a spear.

    What happened to us, to the concept of the scholar-warrior, to the notion of the man of Torah leading the Jewish nation into battle?  In short, the exile robbed us of that, and over the centuries we made – perforce – a virtue out of passivity, pacifism, and even surrender. We artificially created a division of labor in Jewish life between students and soldiers.

    Who better to teach us this point than Yehoshua, depicted in the Torah (Shmot 33:11)  as one “who never left Moshe’s tent,” the tent of study. Really? He never left Moshe’s tent, he was only engaged in the study of Torah? What about Moshe’s command to Yehoshua (Shmot 17:9), “choose men for us and go out to battle with Amalek”? The answer is that the battle itself is part of Torah.

      Rav Zvi Yehuda Kook wrote that “the Torah personality is the fighter who conquers the land of Israel, it is all the same matter.” Only the greatest in Torah study can fully conquer the land of Israel. Indeed, there are two defining statements about Yehoshua, Moshe’s successor: “Moshe received the Torah from Sinai and transmitted it to Yehoshua” (Avot 1:1), and the prophecy of Eldad and Medad in the wilderness, “Moshe will die and Yehoshua will bring Israel into the land” (Sanhedrin 17a). The two statements are inseparable; that was Yehoshua. That was the essence of his Divine service, and that was normal. It was dedication to Torah and divine service that is comprehensive and not bifurcated. Such a personality, and such an endeavor, is not Bitul Torah (the nullification of Torah) but rather Kiyum HaTorah, the very fulfillment of the Torah. Who is more suited to conquering the land of Israel and investing it with holiness than people who love Torah, Divine service and the Jewish people!

    “If the Jewish people had not sinned, we would only have been given the five books of the Torah and the book of Yehoshua, which contains the disposition of the land of Israel” (Nedarim 22b). The books of the prophets admonish us and keep us on the right path. If we were worthy, we would simply obey the Torah – and only require the book of Yehoshua for its description of the allocation of land to each tribe. But why would that be necessary beyond that generation? Once the land was apportioned, then even the book of Yehoshua should be finished. So why is it eternal?

   The answer is that if we had not sinned, we would need only the Torah that tells us how to live and the book of Yehoshua that teaches us how to allocate the land – how to permeate it with holiness, how to implement the Torah and G-d’s will in it. All we would need would be the Torah for a healthy soul and the land of Israel for a healthy body. We would live a holy and holistic existence.

   The exile took such a toll on us that we have had a hard time re-acclimating ourselves to the normalcy of Torah, with many still idealizing the division of responsibilities and incapable of merging the safra and the saifa, the book and the sword. Many persist in re-defining all the giants of Jewish life to make them conform to their pre-conceptions, to render them uni-dimensional figures that ultimately diminish their greatness – whether it is Avraham, Moshe, Yehoshua, David, Yehuda Hamaccabee, Rabbi Akiva and many others. They denude them of their military exploits and ensconce them in the House of Study, as if there is necessarily a conflict between the two or that the two are mutually exclusive. They once might have been – during the exile – but no longer. Today, the halls of the Hesder Yeshivot are populated with Roshei Yeshiva who were Captains, Majors and Colonels in the military – and who better to guide the Torah Jew through the maze of modern life than the contemporary scholar-warrior.

    Rav Shlomo Aviner once identified three cardinal mitzvot that are fulfilled through military service in the IDF: saving Jewish lives, conquest of the land of Israel, and Kiddush Hashem, the sanctification of G-d’s name that is engendered when the nations of the world see that Jewish blood is not cheap. There is another Kiddush Hashem as well – when all Jews see that the Torah can be the foundation of a modern state and that the Torah Jew can serve G-d in every sphere of life. Those mitzvot are certainly vital to an individual Jew’s self-definition as they are to the existence of a Jewish State.

     For sure, a free society can willingly choose to exempt certain Torah scholars from military service as it exempts others for frivolous reasons. But the ideal of the scholar-warrior should be nurtured and cherished as the one best capable of ensuring Israel’s defense and its sacred standing. And it forever deprives the secular Israeli of his persistent complaint, whether sincere or contrived, that “ultra-Orthodox” Jews are parasites who contribute nothing to society and live off the blood and sweat of others. We can hold the book and sword together and achieve greatness in both; can they?

      Fortunate is the generation that has witnessed the renaissance of the Jewish spirit that is a harbinger of the Messiah who himself will personify both virtues – “meditating in the Torah and observing Mitzvot like his ancestor David and fighting G-d’s wars” (Rambam, Hilchot Melachim 11:4) – so that we will all behold the glory of Torah and merit complete redemption, speedily and in our days.

]]> http://rabbipruzansky.com/2012/05/30/the-book-and-the-sword/feed/ 0 Rabbi http://rabbipruzansky.com/2012/05/25/truth-conquers/ http://rabbipruzansky.com/2012/05/25/truth-conquers/#comments Fri, 25 May 2012 17:57:31 +0000 Rabbi http://rabbipruzansky.com/?p=1380 Continue reading →]]> The reality of warfare is such that numbers usually prevail. The Powell Doctrine in force for 20 years in the US military calls for, among other things, the use of overwhelming force to force the enemy to capitulate quickly. In truth, that same doctrine has governed for millennia.

Yet, the Torah generally posits the opposite approach. If we are worthy, then we are attacked by our enemies, then “five of us will pursue 100 of them (a ratio of 20-1), whereas 100 of us can pursue 10,000 of them (a ratio of 100-1)” (Vayikra 26:8), five times as much. Conversely, if we are unworthy, wretched sinners, then later in the Torah (Devarim 32:30) we are told to look with astonishment “how can one of them chase 1000 of us, and two of them chase a myriad of us,” ratios of 1000-1 and 5000-1, respectively? Why does it change?  Why do the numbers change so dramatically from what we can do to our enemies and what they can do to us?

As the period of the omer draws to an end, what haven’t we heard about the sin of the disciples of Rabbi Akiva, “who did not accord each mutual respect” and perished during this season. They didn’t have mutual respect, they demeaned each other, and they saw themselves as separate and apart – despite all the commonalities and despite their joint interests. And this has been a hardy perennial in Jewish life, usually with devastating consequences.

In February, I attended a book launch at the Begin Center in Jerusalem for a new book (published by Geffen) written by Israel’s former Defense and Foreign Affairs Minister Moshe Arens entitled “Flags over the Warsaw Ghetto: The Untold Story of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.” Arens is still very spry and sharp at almost 87 years of age, and he wrote the book to correct what he saw as an historical injustice. The famous story of the revolt has always been told from the perspective of the ZOB (the Jewish Fighting Organization) under the leadership of Mordechai Anielewicz – but there was another group – the ZZB (Jewish Military Organization), led by Pavel Frenkel, that fought equally bravely but whose exploits have been suppressed. Most people have heard of Mordechai Anielewicz, after whom the kibbutz, Yad Mordechai, was named. Few have heard of Pavel Frenkel. Why not ?

The sad truth is that the ZOB were Socialist Zionists who refused to cooperate with the ZZB, who were Revisionists, followers of Ze’ev Jabotinsky. The Zionists fought with the Bundists (anti-Zionist Socialists) and the Jewish Communists – but they refused to fight together with the Betarniks. Each group fought alone, and almost none of the Revisionists survived, so their story was almost unknown. How sad is that? Even the Nazi enemy could not bring the ZOB leadership to set aside their political differences and join forces or even coordinate with the ZZW. (Anielewicz, who came relatively late to the ZOB leadership, is not blamed for this. In fact, Arens dedicated the book to both Mordechai Anielewicz and Pavel Frenkel, both of whom “fought for the honor of the Jewish people.”)

It’s even worse than that, as before the war, the Jews of Warsaw elected a Community Council that was split equally into three factions – the Socialists, the Bundists and Agudat Yisrael. But because they were split evenly, they could not agree on a coalition or even a policy – and Warsaw Jews were left without any leadership, hopelessly divided, as war came to them in 1939. And even worse – almost all of the leadership of the six or seven Jewish organizations in Warsaw fled the city in the first week of September 1939, leaving the remaining Jews to be guided by second and third tier officials who were largely unknown to the community.

This had devastating results, as the political “leadership,” such as it was, could not formulate a coherent response to the Nazi demand in the summer of 1942 that they surrender 60,000 “unproductive” Jews for resettlement. Calls for a rebellion were silenced, as the leadership maintained they would save more lives through cooperation. The Judenrat cooperated, forcibly gathered the requested number of Jews, but the Nazis kept upping the ante. The aktion began on Tish’a B’Av and ended on Yom Kippur in 1942. By that time, not 60,000 but approximately 270,000 Warsaw Jews had been deported to their deaths at Treblinka. The Jewish police who had carried out the orders, and their families, were last group deported. The nominal “leader,” Adam Czerniakow, who had been an engineer, committed suicide in July when it became clear the Nazis had lied to him and he had been played for a fool. Less than 60,000 Jews remained in the Warsaw Ghetto by the time the uprising began. More than 80% had already been murdered – and even then, the Revisionists were rebuffed and forced to fight alone.

All the groups showed great bravery and courage against impossible odds. The early and intense battles were fought in the areas where the Betar forces were most active – a point confirmed by the daily Nazi battlefield reports (introduced as evidence at the Nuremberg trials) that even mentions Betar by name. But the fighter could only repel the Nazis temporarily. Nazi casualties were remarkably low – perhaps a dozen killed and more than 70 wounded. That was largely due to the limitations of the weaponry of the resistance – rifles were scarce, the larger quantity of pistols they had were almost useless in long range fighting, and the Molotov cocktails and grenades momentarily delayed the German assault until they brought in their heavier weapons, including flamethrowers that burned buildings and destroyed bunkers and water that flooded the sewers where many hid. Most Jews were killed or deported to their deaths; there were few survivors, and even fewer among the Revisionist combatants.

What galled Moshe Arens, and gave the book its title, was that in 1949, when Israel was admitted to the UN, Moshe Sharett unfurled a blue-and-white flag that had flown over the Warsaw Ghetto, a symbol of the uprising. That flag enraged the Nazis and inspired the Jews – and some Poles who saw it at a distance outside the ghetto. But that flag flown from the top of the building at 17 Muranowska was the Betar flag – the ZOB could not fly the Zionist flag because it would antagonize their allies, the Bund – and it was unacknowledged, as if it was the flag of the Zionist Socialists whom Sharett was representing.

After the war, the narrative that gained credence was the Zionist Socialist one that almost completely ignored the presence of another force – and for two “good” reasons: the survivors who first published were all from the ZOB, and the animosity that existed between the Zionist Socialists and the followers of Ze’ev Jabotinsky was just as intense in the late 1940s during the struggle for independence as it was in pre-war Europe, if not more so. Barely 18 months after the Uprising was suppressed, the Hagana in Israel began the Hunting Season against the Revisionists, informing on them and turning them over for arrest to the British. The bad blood continued, even in the face of new enemies.

Thankfully, the dysfunction that existed in Warsaw did not exist everywhere – in Vilna, for example, all Jews worked and fought together. And it would not have made a difference ultimately. So why write such a depressing book ? Arens said “veritas vincit” – truth conquers. But I think there is a broader reason, looking forward, not looking backward. It is about “not demonstrating mutual respect.”

The Torah promises that “five of us will pursue 100 of them and 100 of us can pursue 10,000 of them” – when we are worthy. Why? Because a small group that is united and dedicated can defeat much larger groups that are divided and demoralized. Conversely, when we are at loggerheads, then even one of them can pursue 1000 of us – because there is no “thousand.” Each small segment of the “thousand” has its own agenda, small, little groups that are easily vanquished. Rashi cites the Midrash that says, in reference to the disparate ratios, “there is no comparison to what a united multitude can do to what a united minority can do.” The increased effectiveness is exponential, not proportional.

“Love your neighbor as yourself” means that just like we love ourselves with our flaws, so too we have to love other Jews with their flaws. We can disagree, fight and argue, and try to correct each other’s waywardness – but only from love, love that comes only from the fact that we are fellow Jews.

Recognizing the blemishes of the past illuminates for us the struggles of the future. A united community is its own value; a united community with the right values – united by the Torah – is a catalyst for divine blessings of security, prosperity and speedy redemption.

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Word came, again, last week that Mormons were baptizing the dead, including Anne Frank, Simon Wiesenthal’s parents, and even the living like Elie Wiesel, who called upon Mitt Romney to rebuke his church. The latter is certainly misplaced – the Mormon Church has already denounced it – but I have a different reaction: who cares? Does the conversion of the dead mean anything in the real world in which we live? Can a conversion that does not involve the voluntary embrace of a set of ideas, practices and values really mean anything? There are some who are matriculated at the School of Perpetual Outrage. I find it hard to get worked up about something that is inherently meaningless, and reserve my outrage for things that really matter, in the real world, not the fantasy world.

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When gas prices spiked to more than $4.00 per gallon in 2007, the media were rife with accusations that the increases were due to President Bush’s desire to enrich his oil friends. “Bush was to blame!” and it was up to him to rein in his friends and force them to lower their prices. Well. Obama has largely escaped criticism for the recent rise in fuel prices, even though his restrictions on drilling off the coasts, in Alaska, and his rejection of the Keystone pipeline has played havoc with the reliability and pricing of future supplies. Obviously, media bias is apparent, as high oil prices might devastate President Obama’s re-election chances (one reason why he is outspoken in pre-empting any criticism before it even comes). But only two other possibilities present, the latter more plausible: the media has learned that presidents do not control the price of commodities, but the laws of supply and demand do. Or, that somehow, behind the scenes, George W. Bush is still responsible, manipulating oil prices to help enrich his oil friends. That’s about right.

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In a related note, the Arab world now wants the UN to investigate the “Judaization” of Jerusalem. This is a typical Arab gesture – accusing their enemies of doing exactly what they wish to do (massacres, genocides, poisoning, etc.) To save time and money, Israel should admit the charge but point out its untimeliness: Jerusalem was “Judaized” 3000 years ago.

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It is hard to remember the last time any Congress passed legislation because it thought it was good for the country, rather than being good for the special interest groups that ply the victors with money or the blocs of voters that furnish them with votes.

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Saw this somewhere, perhaps the great Thomas Sowell:  “Always be yourself, because the people that matter don’t mind, and the people that mind don’t matter.”

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Isn’t it uncanny (or something else?) that Parshat Zachor is read again this coming Shabbat, and once again the Jewish people are forced to deal with a diabolical, genocidal dictator bent on our extermination – just like Amalek, Haman, Hitler and all the others. “Remembering Amalek” is real, because it reflects the past and the present – and the future – simultaneously. That is why it is a mitzvah to remember Amalek. That is why dealing with Amalek is a dynamic and substantive part of Jewish life.

    Concludes our writer: “There is only one small difference. The Levites were acting under God’s direct command, whereas Matityahu was acting on his own religious zeal and certitude. While we see God’s hand working through the Maccabees, and while were it not for Matityahu’s rebellion the miracle of Chanukah never would have happened, we do not have to endorse this initial act of killing another Jew who was violating the Law. We do not have to endorse an approach that turns a tzaddik into a kanai, a zealot.”

      At least he doesn’t go so far as to turn Matityahu into a rasha, an evildoer, but merely, a zealot. But he was a zealot, as were his sons, and that is why they were successful, and why we celebrate Chanuka until today.

     The linguistic acrobatics performed here are worthy of a circus act. “Were it not for Matityahu’s rebellion, the miracle of Chanuka never would have happened,” so the rebellion ostensibly was a good thing. But “we do not have to endorse this initial act of killing,” because apparently it was a bad thing. But if it was a bad thing, he shouldn’t have done it; but if he didn’t do it, there might not have been a rebellion – after all, “the initial act of killing” was the rebellion. Hmmm…quite a predicament: how can we make Chanuka palatable to the religious left, since it seems to be rooted in many doctrines that are anathema to the religious left: objective truth, moral certitude, justified violence, fierce nationalism and religious zeal. That is quite a predicament.

      Perhaps the rabbi has in mind that Matityahu should have led non-violent rallies against the enemy, written some nasty letters to the editor, negotiated peace with the Syrian conquerors, or –  perhaps even better – allowed himself to be killed while not-resisting, so that 2250 years later liberal Jews would not have to be embarrassed by his actions which only serve to ruin their celebrations of Chanuka. How short-sighted of Matityahu…

     Matityahu and his sons did not believe in religious freedom, or in pluralism, or in peace with the invader, or in sharing the land of Israel with foreigners. They believed in the absolute truth of Torah, in the sanctity of mitzvot, and in an uncompromising loyalty to the Creator, and they were willing to die for their beliefs. And almost all of them did die for their beliefs, including the most famous son of Matityahu, Yehuda HaMaccabee, who was killed in battle not long after the Menora miracle of Chanuka took place.

    It must be painful to celebrate a festival that is repeatedly mentioned in our prayers with a passage that begins “in the days of Matityahu,” and then to have to read approvingly how they “stood against the evil Greek kingdom that attempted to cause them to forget the Torah and to cause them to stray from the statutes of Your will.” It must be even more painful to be forced to recall three times a day that “You, in Your abundant compassion, stood with them in their time of travail,” and with His help they prevailed over their enemies.

    How to avoid such pain, or such cognitive dissonance between the real Chanuka and the contrived Chanuka ? Our writer: “We choose what to remember, and we choose how to see God in the world.” That is to say, since we are troubled (sometimes rightfully so) by religious certitude, arrogance and zealotry, we will eliminate those postures from our celebration of Chanuka, notwithstanding that without those, there is no Chanuka. So he chooses to focus on the miracle of the oil (unmentioned in the Chanuka prayer “al hanissim”) rather than on the rebellion and the military victory that the miracle of the Menora only came to ratify – to confirm that all aspects of Chanuka were the handiwork of G-d.

     The psychological disconnect of Chanuka from modern, liberal sensibilities results from the Maccabim’s rejection of democracy (they were the “few against the many”), humanism (they were the “pure against the impure”), moral relativism (they were the “righteous against the wicked”), pluralism (they were “the diligent students of Torah against the wanton violators”), and reason (they were the “weak against the strong”). All the pillars of the liberal Jew wobble each time the name Matityahu is mentioned, and each time the miracle of Chanuka is commemorated amid feasting and rejoicing, the lighting of the Menorah and the singing of Hallel.

     Of course, there is always a real choice for every Jew – a choice not to try to force the round peg of Torah into the square hole of modern liberalism. There is always a choice – to conform our ideas to those of the Torah, and not try to distort the Torah so they it conforms to our predilections. There is even a choice to re-think cherished assumptions, primarily that good and evil, morality and immorality, and right and wrong, are determined not by the editorial pages of the New York Times but only by the Torah.

     The subtle attempt to link Matityahu’s “extremism” with the evildoers of Bet Shemesh fails, except to the extent that any disfavored violence should be attributed to disfavored people. The Ultra-Distorters who spit on little girls are not Matityahu reincarnate because their motivations are impure and repugnant, and their sexual hang-ups both bizarre and un-Jewish. Their lifestyle and values, such as they are, reflect an obscene failure of education, upbringing and Torah knowledge. The simplest solution would be to imprison them where they can be kept apart from decent society. They are too easy a target even to criticize – but not a rightist fringe of Jewish life; there is nothing “right” about them – and they have few defenders of any standing in the Rabbinical or Jewish world.

       But Chanuka celebrates certainty. It is why we have survived many cruel and harsh enemies, and even survived many pleasant-sounding notions that are really the death knell of Jewish life. Jewish nationalism is not restricted to jingoistic expressions of greatness but is designed to cultivate a nation that will better the world and be a source of blessing for the entire planet. The celebration of Chanuka internalizes that objective and advances that goal – of pride and accomplishment, of purposeful survival, of righteousness and faith, of self-sacrifice and intense dedication to Torah – and to true Jewish values.

     So thank you, Matityahu and family, and happy Chanuka to all.

Moreover, the Rambam continues that “the mitzva of Ner Chanuka is most precious (chaviva hi ad me’od) and one has to be extremely careful in order to inform others of the miracle, and to expand on it in praise and thanksgiving to G-d.”

But why is this particular mitzva so precious ? There are other mitzvot that we have that also purport to publicize miracles – most famously the reading of the Megila and the drinking of four cups of wine on Pesach. In neither place does Rambam call those mitzvot precious – so why does he use that term only in reference to Ner Chanuka ? And why do we say of the Chanuka candles that they are “holy” – what’s so holy about Ner Chanuka ?

And one other, fundamental question: Why Chanuka ? Why do we commemorate ancient but short-lived victories ? The  Chashmonaim had their moment and served a valuable function 22 centuries ago, but they disappeared 20 centuries ago. The monarchy they established was a fleeting phenomenon in Jewish history, and the Mikdash they lovingly rededicated was destroyed two centuries later  – so why celebrate their achievements that have long ago been dimmed by history ?

Rav Soloveitchik zt”l explained by citing the Gemara Shabbat (22b) that the Menorah in the Mikdash served only one purpose: “it was evidence that the Divine Presence rests on the Jewish people.” So, too, the Rav said, Ner Chanuka is a symbol of G-d’s enduring presence among the Jewish people in every age and in every location in the world. In essence, in the absence of the Mikdash, Ner Chanuka is the means by which we demonstrate every year that we are the Chosen People.

That was one of the primary clashes between the Jews and the Hellenists. The latter maintained that the Jewish people had to renounce any notion of chosenness, to them a cause of Jew-hatred that we ourselves provoked. They argued that we were just like everyone else, and the very concept of a “chosen” people was repugnant to their modern sensibilities.

It still is. Of course, the early Christians claimed for themselves the mantle of the New Israel, but it fascinating that the early Americans did the same. The Pilgrims called themselves New Israel, sprinkled the colonies liberally with biblical names, and saw America as the “Promised Land.” Benjamin Franklin even wanted the Great Seal of the US to depict the crossing of the Red Sea, and Thomas Jefferson thought a better image was the Israelites in the wilderness being led by a pillar of fire and a cloud. (Instead, they chose the bald eagle and other symbols.)

Nonetheless, all this imagery – and the idea of a “manifest destiny” – fed the notion of American exceptionalism, which, sad to say, even high-ranking American politicians have repudiated of late. And even Jews are uncomfortable with the concept of an “am hanivchar.”. One of my putative colleagues on the far left fringe of the Orthodox rabbinate not long ago described the notion of chosenness as “a moment of imperfection in G-d’s creation and decision-making.” It is “problematic” to single out one people for leadership. Hmmm…well, someone’s imperfect.

The publicizing of Chanuka is not merely a reminder of the miracle of Chanuka and the salvation of Israel from our enemies, but primarily proof that the divine presence rests on the people of Israel. Our relationship with G-d is based on two components – our acceptance of

G-d’s oneness and the special character of the descendants of Avraham. That’s why the Rambam says the mitzvah is “to demonstrate and publicize the miracle” – to demonstrate what is already known but also to reveal what is not widely known, or widely accepted: to explain why we fought then, why we fight today, what G-d expects of us, and what is His vision for mankind.

And that is why the Ner Chanuka is a “very precious Mitzva,” treasured and cherished, and why these flames are holy, set aside not to use but to examine, understand, and investigate this unique phenomenon of an eternal people and its relationship to the Creator. Megila and the four cups on Pesach recall a particular event – Chanuka is more than that: it is a celebration of our unique relationship with G-d that has never faltered and that transcends time and space.

Thus, after the victory, the Chashmonaim endeavored to formalize the notion of the chosen people in halacha – reinforcing the ban on intermarriage, and adding to the laws of purity and impurity – all of which served to stem the tidal wave of assimilation in those days, and serves as a model for our time as well. That is the Chanuka that deserves celebration every year. It is not just the miracles of old, but His loving embrace that reminds us then and now that redemption comes not through might or power but through G-d’s spirit, and our fidelity to that spirit.

     Of course Newt was right. Interestingly, few, if any of his most rabid critics in the Arab world and in the anti-Israel media even challenged his thesis. They focused on the prudence and propriety of the statement, on the ever-shifting balance between the Old Newt and the New Newt, and the prospects of “peace” in the Middle East given this startling and audacious admission.

    But of course Newt was right, if impolitic. It wasn’t that long ago when Israel’s Prime Minister, the late Golda Meir, made such an assertion herself. In a statement to The Sunday Times (June 15, 1969), she said: “There is no such thing as a Palestinian people… It is not as if we came and threw them out and took their country. They didn’t exist.” All Newt did was state a bald-faced truth that has been obscured for too long.

    That is not to say that there have not been Arabs living in what they called Palestine for generations. There have been Arabs living in the land of Israel for quite a while, just like there have been Jews living in Israel – in an unbroken chain of residence – since antiquity. But the Arabs of Israel never had a national identity, and never sought statehood or independence until the Jews returned en masse in the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries. (Previous Jewish residents were forced to live without any national rights and subservient to the Muslim, Christian, Turkish – the latter for 400 years until 1917 – and finally British rulers.) It is Palestinian “nationalism” and “peoplehood” that were contrived by Jew-haters and anti-Zionists.

    Thus, it is well known that the early 20^th century Arabs of the land of Israel called themselves “Southern Syrians” and derided the early Jewish settlers as “Palestinians.” (How’s that for marketing?) Those same Arabs rejected the UN state proffered to them in 1947, and then “neglected” to seek statehood from 1948-1967 when Judea, Samaria and Gaza were controlled by fellow Arabs. In other words, the “Palestinian people” that Newt neutered, and “Palestinian nationalism” itself, were both inconsequential formulations that only exist to undermine and disqualify the Jewish State of Israel. To underscore the point, had there been no “Israel” created in 1948, the territory of “Palestine” would have been distributed to a variety of Arab entities to the north and east, themselves creations of the international community. But an “Arab Palestine,” as an independent state, would have been on no one’s radar, as it was not until, as Newt pointed out, the 1970s.

     Jews have lived in Israel since time immemorial (the title of Joan Peter’s famous work), and even after the destruction of the Second Temple and the great exile, Jews remained. Jews remained in the 2^nd -4^th centuries to write the Jerusalem Talmud, draft the permanent calendar and even entertain, for a time in the 4^th century, the building of another Temple with permission from Julian the Apostate; in the 5^th-6^th centuries to cling to the land amid the Byzantine and Christian persecutions; in the 6^th-11^th centuries to survive the Muslim invasion – returning to Yerushalayim with permission from the Emperor Omar and observing the founding of the only town founded by Arabs in the land of Israel during their entire sojourn – Ramle; suffering the torments of the Crusaders in the 12^th century; enduring the Muslim re-conquest in the 12-15^th centuries in which the land saw a constant stream of Jewish visitors and/or residents, including Rambam, Ramban, R. Yechiel of Paris, and many others; the 16^th century that witnessed the flourishing of Jewish life – the composition – in Israel! – of the Shulchan Aruch and the rise of the giants of Kabbala; the 17-18^th centuries during which both Sefardic and Ashkenazic Jews bolstered existing communities throughout the land of Israel and founded new ones, and the 19^th century, when the Zionist movement in a variety of forms took root.

    Is there a similar “Palestinian” history ? Of course not. Throughout the ages, Jews both persevered in the land, and prayed for the restoration of Jewish sovereignty. It is absurd to even suggest there is a competing Palestinian narrative that bears any substance or validity. As I have noted before in this space, choose any century in the past 2000 years, and try to name a “Palestinian” of any sort. That is why the Arab apologists have been forced to assert that “Jesus was a Palestinian” (Arafat, apparently unaware that Jesus was a Jew) or, in the last week, that the “Palestinians” are descendants of the ancient Yevusi. (Really? I thought they descended from the Girgashi.) That is why the official Palestinian line of the last decade, emanating first from Arafat, is that there is “no Jewish Temple, no Jewish nationalism and no Jewish connection to the land.” The hat burns on the thief’s head. They have no indigenous connection to the land of Israel, and only arrived in large numbers after Jewish settlement began and to take advantage of the opportunities presented by Jewish settlement. Certainly, Chanuka itself reinforces the deep bond that the Jewish people have for, and in, the land of Israel.

    Usually, the Arabs have sought at this point to shift this uncomfortable conversation by saying that “there will never be peace if we argue over history.” But that is a tactic designed to move the debate from the realm of facts and reason to the charade of myth and fantasy, and to obscure the basic function of “Palestinian nationalism” – an Islamic/Arab marketing device to undercut and destabilize Israel’s existence by embracing Western nomenclature of human rights, self-determination, victim refugees, etc.

    Others effectively concede that there really is no historical “Palestinian people” (John Bolton also said as much the other day), but the political reality today is that they “exist” in the media, in the diplomatic chambers, in the UN, and in the land of Israel – so they exist today even if they never existed before, and therefore must be dealt with as if they are a real people.

    This would be a compelling argument, but only if the starting point is that “peace” is somehow possible to attain with an invented nation that denies one’s own existence. That bubble has been burst for many thinking people (excluding, among others, NY Times “experts” on foreign policy) and now resembles more a pagan fantasy than serious statecraft. But nothing valuable or meaningful can be built on a foundation of lies, and the State of Israel, nonetheless, remains guilty of propagating the Palestinian national fantasies while pandering to their blatant lies.

Take, for example, the recent and ongoing ruckus over the renovations of the Mughrabi Gate walkway to the Temple Mount that is in the process of crumbling, not to mention a terrible eyesore. This construction has been challenged by the Muslims as an attempt by the Jews to “undermine the foundations of the Al-Aksa Mosque.” (Of course, when the bridge collapses, those same Muslims will allege that the Jews destroyed it in order to kill Muslims and to “undermine the foundations of the Al-Aksa Mosque.”) For some mysterious reason (fecklessness is the working theory), the Netanyahu government has abdicated its responsibilities to the Jordanian authorities, a shameful renunciation of sovereignty and a tacit acceptance of the lie that the Jews are attempting to “undermine the foundations of the Al-Aksa Mosque.”

The Israelis should rebuild that collapsing bridge for many reasons – it needs it, it is dangerous, it is now hideous-looking with all the scaffolding surrounding it, and it is acting as the sovereign entity in its capital city within shouting distance of the holiest place in Judaism – but primarily to expose the lie that the re-construction is designed to – you guessed it – “undermine the foundations of the Al-Aksa Mosque.”

Lies have legs. Mark Twain famously said that “a lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.” With a complicit media and the Internet, lies these days can travel around the world several times before truth is even aware of the lie’s existence. For too long, Israel and its supporters have been guilty of accepting the Palestinian lies – history, narrative, policies, accusations (remember Suha Arafat, Hillary Clinton and the poison gas charge? The Egyptian media and the Israel-spreading-AIDS charge? Et al) and reportage without serious and sustained challenge. That time, thanks to Newt, should be long past.

Newt Gingrich may or may not become president, but he has served a valuable function in this regard – defying convention, stupefying his adversaries, and shocking the American-Jewish establishment – by telling an unvarnished truth. Call it “political Newt-ity,” for he has laid bare the hollowness of the enemies’ claims against Israel and exposed their lies, and our inexplicable acquiescence in them.