Category Archives: Jewish History

Ask The Rabbi, Part 6

Posted on August 24, 2020 | Comments Off

Last year, I was invited to be part of a panel of rabbis to submit answers to questions posed by the editor of the Jewish Press. The column appears bi-weekly, and I take this opportunity to present my approach to the questions raised. Each question is fascinating in its own right, as are the variety of answers proffered. All the answers can be viewed at Jewishpress.com.

Here is the sixth selection with my take on these issues – RSP

Is it appropriate to share mother-in-law jokes?

Humor is often used to defuse tension, and no relationship is fraught with more tension than that of in-laws. The Talmud (Yevamot 2a) itself refers to mothers-in-law as tzarot (rivals or adversaries) as in the worst circumstances they compete for the affections of their child with the new spouse. But those are under the worst circumstances, which is not to say they don’t occur with some frequency.

Certainly, one has to respect one’s in-laws (see Yoreh Deah 240:24, and Taz 19), presumably out of gratitude that they gave life to one’s spouse. Warm relations with one’s in-laws gladden your spouse and make for a better marriage, notwithstanding the occasional bumps in the road in any relationship. And it is those bumps that have engendered the popular mother-in-law jokes.

Generally, one is not allowed to joke about a person even if that person will not be offended by it, because who for sure knows whether offense is taken? Jokes about the individual would therefore be inappropriate; conversely, jokes about the institution are less troubling, especially if the mother-in-law knows they are in jest. (Sometimes it seems as if the primary purpose for the creation of the Internet was the sharing of jokes.)

We shouldn’t be so stuffy as to disallow any form of humor, particularly when it is playful and not malicious. Chazal (Avot 6:5) even noted that “mi’ut sechok,” a little humor, is one of the 49 ways through which the Torah is acquired. Chazal didn’t say “no humor,” but rather “a little humor.” It should be acceptable in this context as well. After all, even Moshe Rabbenu, given the choice of living with his in-laws or returning to his enslaved brethren in Egypt, left Yitro and returned to the house of bondage. Doesn’t that say it all?

For hundreds of years, Jews in Poland fasted on the 20th of Sivan to commemorate the tens of thousands of Jews killed in 1648-49 in the Chmielnitzky uprising. Yet, we don’t fast today for the six million Jews killed in the Holocaust. Why not?

We probably should but there are several reasons why we don’t. Some point to a statement in the kinot – “for we may not add a new day of mourning over ruin and burning,” a reference to the Crusades. But as the question implies, the fact that Jews in Poland did fast renders that reason less than compelling, even if the kinot were an authoritative halachic source.

I think the real reason is broader and an unhealthy reflection on our society today. Polish Jews formed one community. It is probably fanciful to say that all were religious but at least they all saw themselves as part of one nation. Sadly, that is no longer true in Jewish life. Polish Jewry had a central leadership body – the Council of the Four Lands – that could issue decrees to which all Jews felt bound. We no longer have a respected council of leaders that all Jews respect.

Moreover, how many Jews today fast the established four fasts, such that a decree to establish another would be heeded? Fasts are designed to be catalysts for teshuvah, repentance. How many Jews sincerely engage in acts of repentance? The Holocaust devastated mainly, although not exclusively, Ashkenazic Jewry. It would be very difficult to convince, say, most American Jews to accept an additional fast.

That being said, the current observances of Yom Hashoah fall short of a meaningful commemoration of this unique and horrific calamity. They tend to consist of contrived ceremonies, survivor accounts, hollow expressions of “Never Again,” and the pursuit of the broader agenda of the organizers. There is little religious perspective added, and almost no attempt to fit the Holocaust into the context of Jewish history before and after it. That might have to wait another generation and those proper observances will include a public fast.

Should the average Jew learn Kabbalah?

Much depends on how we define “Kabbalah.” Certainly traditional Kabbalah bears absolutely no relationship to the mass market Kabbalah that distributes amulets and holy water, emphasizes the recitation of enigmatic texts and is mostly New Age-type self help for the vulnerable.

Traditional Kabbalah, as taught in the Zohar, the writings of the Ari”zal and his disciples and later expositors as well, focuses on the inner workings of the universe, a deeper understanding of G-d and the role of Israel in the world. It tries to resolve the conundrum of how an incorporeal G-d created, sustained and continues to relate to a corporeal universe. The problems lie in the broad use of physical imagery and anthropomorphic terms to refer to these extremely esoteric concepts. These expressions are liable to engender in the casual reader a grave misunderstanding of fundamental principles of the Torah, especially relating to the nature of G-d.

Generally, these rarefied subjects in the Torah are limited to those, as Rambam writes in a related context (Hilchot Yesodei HaTorah 4:13), “whose stomachs are filled with bread and meat, i.e., to know what is permissible and prohibited in the Mitzvot…and these must precede [the stroll through the Pardes, the orchard] because they train us how to think, perfect this world and prepare us for the world-to-come…”

Rambam underscores that even the greatest sages were not always comfortable with this study. How less comfortable, then, should be Jews who are not yet filled with the wisdom of Torah, are not fully observant, nor conversant with Jewish philosophy! The immature student of Kabbalah can be easily harmed by its study and draw incorrect and heretical conclusions about G-d.

We should all be extremely hesitant before embarking on such a study, and only then with a qualified teacher.

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Posted in Contemporary Life, Jewish History, Minhagim

Exit Strategy

Posted on August 21, 2020 | 1 comment

This is one of the truest but most difficult lessons in life: it is better to leave when they want you to stay than to stay when they want you to leave. Said another way, it is better to leave too early than to leave too late.

I certainly experienced that in my own life in the last nineteen months. We should all be equipped with an internal clock that tells us when it is time to stop doing something you enjoy, and were successful at, and let others have their shot. But we are not so equipped. And it is not an exact science. Our departure times cannot be calibrated like trains in Europe and this has always been a bane of the rabbinate and, classically (because the duration of a career is much shorter) in sports. Those who recall the great but aging Willie Mays falling down in the outfield know the sensation. No rabbi, doctor, lawyer, businessman, hi tech genius or athlete wants to fall down on the job. And this applies with particular cogency to politicians.

This is not about Joe Biden (although it could be) but about Binyamin Netanyahu, who is Israel’s longest serving prime minister but is now hemorrhaging support and under siege. Granted, his enemies will always despise him and the criminal charges against him are frivolous, which is not to say he will necessarily be acquitted of them. Anyone who feels that Netanyahu has exploited his office to get rich will not be dissuaded by evidence or reality. It has become common in western societies for opposition politicians to use prosecution to weaken and then disable leaders who cannot be defeated at the polls.

Netanyahu is losing support among his followers, his base, and that warrants some analysis. Israel’s government has been paralyzed, more or less, for several years now, with repetitive and inconclusive elections. Netanyahu has not been able to, and cannot, form a parliamentary majority of like-minded coalition partners; whatever the reason, that is the reality. It is possible – and certainly will happen down the road – that other Likud or right-wing figures would be able to cobble together a governing coalition but PM Netanyahu has alienated so many people in his own party, and certainly in the other sectors of the Israeli political system, that he has crashed into his electoral ceiling.

Had he stepped aside this past March – when again his coalition fell just short of a Knesset majority – he might have been hailed as Israel’s greatest prime minister. Having weathered the Corona virus storm, he would be extolled for presiding over an unprecedented era in Israeli life of peace and prosperity, of growing international appreciation and diplomatic recognition, of leading the world’s charge against the Iranian nuclear program, of forming the closest possible ties with the United States, and of ushering Israel into the forefront of the world’s economies and technological entrepreneurs.

Instead, the Corona virus returned with a vengeance (it probably never really left) and Netanyahu had no coherent plan to combat it – much like every other leader (and critic of that leader) in the world. And now his failures stand out. Like elsewhere, Israel’s economy has taken a Corona hit and unemployment is high. The unfulfilled promises loom large – annexation of even part of Judea and Samaria, the legalization of settlements and their protection against baseless and evidence-free lawsuits, the on-again, off-again building/freeze in the settlements, limiting the powers of the Supreme Court and the Attorney-General, two institutions that frequently undermine democracy, and others.

For sure, some of these are – and will be – trotted out as new promises in the next election campaign and those who believe it deserve to be fooled again. But why do people hang on too long and ruin their legacy?

One reason is the belief, sincere or otherwise, that only they can do the job and there will be deterioration in performance, productivity and achievement if they leave. Whether or not it is true is irrelevant. The old quip – “the graveyards are full of indispensable men” – still pertains. The departure of a long-time leader causes feelings of displacement, confusion and occasionally even despair, but somehow the world muddles on. It is not the same, which is not to say that it is better or worse.

The second reason is more prevalent. It is difficult to relinquish positions of power and influence. King George III, just defeated by the colonies, and informed that General George Washington was going to resign his commission, give up power and return to Mount Vernon, said, “If he does that, he will be the greatest man in the world.” It was unthinkable, and Washington did it twice!

Both reasons are often conflated and both played a role in the passage of the 22^nd Amendment to the United States Constitution that limits the service of an American president to no more than two terms. Proposed in 1947, and ratified less than four years later, it was an obvious reaction to FDR’s triumph in four consecutive elections, unprecedented in American history.

One might well ask: isn’t this amendment, and aren’t term limits generally, extreme encroachments on the democratic process? After all, FDR won his elections because majorities voted for him, albeit declining majorities in 1940 and 1944. But he won fair and square. Why, then, the limitation?

The paradox of the two reasons cited above for hanging on – the leader’s belief in his indispensability and the difficulty in relinquishing power – is that large numbers of people come to believe the same thing. It is the power of incumbency, the comfort level the electorate has with a reining leader. Life becomes, to some extent, unimaginable, without them.

Nothing is normal in politics or life these days but unremarked upon is this anomaly. If President Trump is re-elected (as of this writing, he has a greater than 47% chance of re-election) and he serves another full four years, it will be the first time in American history that four consecutive presidents each serve two full terms. In fact, when his three predecessors (Obama, Bush and Clinton) each served eight years in office, that became only the second time in American history such occurred, and the first in almost two centuries. Not since Jefferson, Madison and Monroe (1801-1825) did three consecutive presidents serve the full two terms. Presidents 42, 43, and 44 pulled off a feat that had not happened since it was done by Presidents 3, 4 and 5. That encompasses a lot of years and a lot of presidents, and yet it is true.

Incumbency carries great advantages but the recent success of presidential incumbents might be attributable at least partly to the public’s realization that he will be gone anyway in, maximum, another four years. Leader fatigue has no time to set in. (That is generally; among Trump’s detractors, “leader fatigue” beset them on January 21, 2017, if not already on November 9, 2016.)

Parliamentary democracies have no such built-in constraints. Thus, except for Menachem Begin who resigned and left office, Israel’s prime ministers have exited office repudiated by the voters (except for the two extraordinary cases of assassination and criminal corruption).

What is Netanyahu’s exit strategy? Well, he has none and thus his tenure is not likely to end well. Understandably, he does not want to leave by being forced out by his enemies. But he does have the ability to change course, groom successors and plan a comfortable post-politics life that can be filled with new challenges suitable for a person of his talents. It stands to reason that the tendentious criminal charges against him would disappear as well.

For that, one needs to sing a few bars like Kenny Rogers once did: “You’ve got to know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em, know when to walk away, know when to run.” Most don’t know that, and their reputations, businesses, and careers suffer.

But those who know often find great rewards in the “after” life. It pays to plan and then to carry out that plan.

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Posted in Contemporary Life, Current Events, Israel, Jewish History

Not Day, Not Night

Posted on April 14, 2020 | Comments Off

Towards the end of the hagada, in the piyut that catalogs the momentous events that have occurred in our history at midnight (“Vayehi bachatzi halailah”), we ask Hashem to “bring near the day that is neither day nor night.” It sounds like a contradiction in terms – how can there be a day that is not a day or a night? It might be twilight – but that is not a “day,” that is a very brief period of time.

And then that passage ends by contradicting even that: “Illuminate the darkness of night with the light of day.” So which is it? Do we want the darkness brightened – or do we want the day that is neither day nor night?

The piyut is discussing the Messianic era, and this phrase is based on a recurrent refrain in Tanach. Zechariah (14:7) prophesied of the time when “there will be a day known to Hashem – not day or night, but towards evening there will be light.” And right before (14:6) he said “on that day, there will not be a bright light or a dim light.”

And note something else as well. The critical verse that defines the night of the seder contains what seems like an error. The key mitzvah of the seder is “you will tell your child on that day, that this is why G-d took us out of Egypt” (Sh’mot 13:8). But, in fact, we don’t tell our child on that day but rather on that night. Indeed, it would seem then, that the night of the seder is referred to as that day. Why is that?

Night, as we know, is always symbolic of exile – darkness, murkiness, confusion, a lack of clarity. At night, man is inactive – and even alarmed because we are exposed to the elements, to nature, even to human marauders. Night reflects the mists of the moment, when our world is perplexing, uncertain, unclear and more than a little frightening. Day is clarity, optimism, knowledge and redemption. On that day, the Torah says, G-d redeemed us. The Red Sea split – “And G-d saved Israel on that day from the hands of Egypt” (Sh’mot 14:30).

What Zechariah taught us is far-reaching in its significance. The era before the redemption is a time of “not day or night.” There are so many different, confounding and contradictory events and circumstances. On one hand, there is affluence, technological development, great sophistication – and yet we are suddenly humbled by plagues and illnesses and by the insecurity that surrounds us. Is it “day” now for the world – or is it “night”?

Indeed, it is exactly what was prophesied: “It is neither day nor night.” The Baal HaMetzudot commented that in that era “Israel will be perplexed, not knowing whether events are the prelude to salvation or destruction.”

The night of the seder and Pesach itself, the Zohar writes (Parshat Bo) is a time when “the night is as bright as the longest days of summer.” It is the moment of clarity in the world, when Hashem’s mighty hand is revealed, and all becomes clear. The world can be in darkness, but “for the children of Israel there was light in their dwelling places. The sun can set, but still “And on that day you shall relate to your children” of the miraculous exodus from Egypt.

When Hashem is visible and His influence is palpable and undeniable – like in Egypt – that is the time when “towards evening it will be light.” We are waiting for the divine light to be as it was when the world was created. On Pesach we re-experience the Exodus when there were no doubts or uncertainty in the world – only the overpowering reality of Hashem’s presence.

As that day nears – the day that is neither day nor night – Pesach both tantalizes us with the range of possibilities, and challenges us to bring them closer, hasten their arrival, and actualize them in the real world. Our day is one in which, if we open our eyes even a little, the darkness can and will dissipate and we will see the light, and merit the grandeur of the coming redemption.

May Hashem extend His protective hand around His people, send healing to the ill and consolation to the bereaved, end this scourge, and usher in the future of light and brightness and joy, for our community and all of Israel.

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Posted in Current Events, Holidays, Jewish History, Machshava/Jewish Thought

Deal of the Century: Cautious Pessimism

Posted on January 28, 2020 | 1 comment

The most pro-Israel American president in history just released the most pro-Israel American peace plan in history, and the first that doesn’t call on Israel to make “painful sacrifices” up front or expect Israeli concessions in exchange for empty words, gestures and ceremonies. Do I think it will bring real peace? Certainly not. But it leaves me cautiously pessimistic for the future (optimism in the Middle East is misplaced until the coming of Moshiach).

The negative: recognition of a Palestinian state is a bone in the throat of every Torah Jew (or should be), as is the potential loss of sovereignty over parts of the heartland of the Jewish people that G-d granted us for eternity. As one rabbi once put it, no generation has the right to compromise the boundaries of the land of Israel that were given to us by the Creator and delineated in the Torah. That land is the possession of the Jewish people for all time and no single individual, group or generation has the moral, halachic or legal right to waive that possession. This sentiment was expressed not by a Religious Zionist but in 1937, by the vociferously anti-Zionist Rav Elchanan Wasserman HY”D, in encouraging opposition to the Peel Commission’s partition plan.

The loss of Israeli territory in the Negev is especially gratuitous and irksome, especially considering the years of war and terror and hostility that the Arabs foisted on Israel. A formal place for them in Yerushalayim is similarly agonizing, even it is doesn’t change much the reality on the ground.

Secondly, the negotiations over the agreement almost presuppose a right-wing government in Israel because a left-wing government would use this basic framework – a tacit acceptance by the right-wing of a Palestinian state and the surrender of more territory – and negotiate into weakness, danger, and vulnerability. There should be no confidence that a right-wing government will rule Israel after the next election (or the one that will follow a few months later). With PM Netanyahu’s formal indictment today, just hours before the White House announcement, his prospects for heading the next government have dimmed even more. Hence the hazards ahead, which will be entrusted to less experienced politicians and leaders.

So why then is this plan not an unmitigated disaster, as has been almost every other American or Israeli peace plan going back to the Rogers plan in 1969? It is because it must be measured not against Paradise but against the status quo. The status quo has worked well for Israel in the last decade. Terror exists but has been drastically reduced, the economy is thriving, personal security and well-being have been enhanced, and the situation in the countries surrounding Israel has superseded any internal anxiety. The “Palestinians” have been marginalized by the Arab world, much less by the West. Their bad choices have finally caught up to them. They have no base of support, no passionate advocates anymore beyond the Israeli and the American Jewish left. They are thus reduced to ranting and raving, making wild threats, burning pictures of President Trump, and chanting. Their vehement opposition to this plan is one of its important selling points.

It brings to mind Abba Eban’s famous quip that that “Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.” There should be confidence that they will miss this opportunity as well, thus rendering moot Israel’s technical agreement to a Palestinian state and partial renunciation of sovereignty. (Indeed, Israel hasn’t formally accepted those terms; it has simply agreed to use the Trump as the framework for negotiations.) Finally, after many decades, Arab intransigence has cost them. Yes, they should have accepted the original Camp David offer of autonomy in 1978, complied with the Oslo agreement of the 1990’s, embraced the Clinton parameters of the year 2000, the Olmert plan of 2007, etc. Shoulda, woulda, coulda. They didn’t. Their leadership always fails them miserably, if indeed they are truly representative of their people. They have always implemented the game plan of rejecting offers in the hopes of getting a better one at some point, pocketing tangible concessions in exchange for words (the classic has always been “renouncing terror”) and never really conceding anything tangible of their own.

That dynamic has now been reversed, and how that must stick in the craw of the old Oslo, two-state illusion crowd. Now, Israel will within days be able to declare full sovereignty over the Jordan Valley and the settlements in Judea and Samaria; a concrete and substantial achievement up front. It is the Palestinian state that has to be created over the course of next four years and only if the Arabs adhere to certain benchmarks that alone would alter the nature of Palestinian society. And if they don’t – and who really thinks they will? – Israel will have pocketed this enormous diplomatic accomplishment at absolutely no cost. That is genius, and credit goes to the diplomatic team that conjured up this strategy. The onus is on the Arabs – to accept the plan as a basis for negotiations even as it makes absolutely no reference to a return of refugees or compensation for loss of homes, and implicitly rejects both. And both of those claims, surely, if raised, would be balanced against similar and more substantive claims by Jews who were forced to flee Arab lands in the late 1940’s and early 1950’s.

What the Trump Plan has accomplished is force the Palestinians to confront their suicidal ideology and genocidal ambitions head on. That won’t be easy for them, and they will likely be unable to overcome their rabid Jew hatred (although giving their kleptocrats access to $50B might be irresistible enough to compel them to say the right words and open the spigots of money). Tellingly, representatives of three Arab countries were at the White House today, another indication of how the allegiances in the Middle East have shifted in the last several years even as Palestinian diplomacy, if that word can even be used in their context, has remained stagnant. They are trapped in a time warp, the world has passed them by, and their only hope for their future is to come to terms with the new reality. Their old game plan has left them in last place. Hysteria is a poor substitute for statecraft.

But their fallback position in times of diplomatic opportunity has always been terror, and that too engenders some cautious pessimism. Their leadership has already rejected the plan (MK Ahmed Tibi, somehow still a member of Knesset: “this is a wedding without the bride”). It would be unsurprising if missiles and rockets start to fly or if bombs start exploding in cities, r”l. Israel is naturally on high alert but perfection in these matters is difficult to sustain permanently. We will need divine mercy and the thwarting of the evil plans of our enemies.

It is clear that only Donald Trump could have produced such a plan. The deep state of the State Department must be apoplectic, and the Israel haters in the EU must be beside themselves wondering how this happened. The Arabs must be wondering how this guy ever got elected. (They are not alone!) He ran as a disrupter, and this is a characteristic disruption. After annexation of even parts of Judea, Samaria and the Jordan Valley by Israel, the terrain – literal and diplomatic – will be significantly and perhaps even permanently altered. There is still land in Judea and Samaria (about a third) whose disposition will be frozen for four years and awaits negotiations. Time is on Israel’s side.

And it took this President to do it. Perhaps Jews will notice. Israel wins merely by improving the status quo in its favor and would certainly gain if the other side acquiesced in its existence. But that too is unnecessary in the near term. History is made through such decisions. Even if it is not all to my liking, the deal of the century represents a sea change for the region, dramatic and positive steps for Israel and a day of reckoning for the Palestinians. You can oppose a Palestinian state and a further partition of Israel and still implicitly favor this proposal. What makes it an especially good deal for Israel is that the Arabs will reject it – leaving Israel advantaged for the future in a multitude of ways that should inspire chants of “Make Israel Great Again.” Or something like that.

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Posted in Contemporary Life, Israel, Jewish History