העורך Editor

“A Wholly Life” is a Targum/Feldheim compilation from 2005, edited by Dr. Moshe Kaplan. It contains a blistering essay by Rabbi Berel Wein against hollow Judaism, p. 108, called “The Jew in the Land of Plenty“.

The article opens with Mishlei 13:7, as translated by Rabbi Malbim.

“There is one who waxes wealthy and possesses nothing, and one who is impoverished and has great wealth.”

Rabbi Wein continues:

Jewish history is replete with differing problems, paradoxes, and challenges. But the basic problem that faces every generation is how to remain truly Jewish in an overwhelmingly non-Jewish world. The Torah itself addresses this problem: “How do these nations worship their gods? Let me also do likewise!” And the story of the Jewish people in their long exile is again one of that struggle to remain uniquely Jewish in spite of the pressures of an alien, encroaching and different world.

Rabbi Wein goes on to note the special difficulty of American Orthodoxy in an age of prosperity coupled with negligible hostility toward Jews. He admits the comment by Rabbi S. R. Hirsch, “The Marranos of Spain were goyim on the outside and Jews on the inside. My Jews are reverse Marranos” still rings true.

In the context of choosing an “אמנות נקיה וקלה”, Rabbi Wein tells of a mother who complained her son would be “losing” a year of medical education if he went to study in Israel after graduation: “He may discover the cure for cancer”.

His answer was hard for her to swallow:

God has created a great and varied world. There are over four billion non-Jews in the world. We don’t have to do everything in the world by ourselves. The Jews are not obligated to supply all of the doctors, lawyers, judges, corporate raiders, real-estate-developers, and entrepreneurs of this world. The Jews are, however, obligated to be the Jewish people, with all the moral and ethical obligations that this implies. We should have no objection to an Italian or an Irishman or a Black or a Hispanic discovering the cure for cancer. But Torah, halacha, Jewish ethics, and eternal value systems are the primary Jewish agenda, both nationally and individually. What I can do, only I can do; our role in the world is therefore very exclusive…

So, Eretz Yisrael is an imperfect alternative; indeed, the aforequoted verses concern Israel. But, there’s an old story with the Vilna Gaon.

The Maggid of Dubna was once paid by the Gaon to give him Mussar. One of the things the Maggid said was: It’s no “Kuntz” (Yiddish: big deal), to be so great while remaining closeted in one’s room studying Torah day and night. Let’s see you mix with others, perhaps to influence them, yet remain at this level of Torah and Mitzvos (or thereabouts)! The Gaon aptly rejected the idea. (I probably butchered the story!)

It’s easier to be a real Jew when living in Eretz Yisrael: Must you make it so hard on yourself in Chutz La’aretz?!

A quote from Rabbi Hershel Schachter:

Hashem selected one nation to serve as a role model for all the others regarding how to go in His ways. The novi Yeshaya says, “am zu yotzarti“, i.e. that the am ha’nivchar was a distinct creation of Hashem. According to nature, Klal Yisroel really should not exist, since the Chumash tells us that the imahos were akoros (unable to bear children), and the Talmud tells us (in Yevomos perek He’oreil) that Avrohom, Yitzchok, and Yaakov were akorim as well. As such, the whole existence of Klal Yisroel is l’maaleh min hatevah.

This probably explains the mysterious phenomenon of anti-Semitism which persists throughout all generations. A body naturally rejects foreign objects (and therefore when surgeons do an organ transplant they have to be concerned about the organ being rejected), and Klal Yisroel does not fit in to the natural system which makes up the rest of the world; Klal Yisroel was created as a separate yitzira which is l’maaleh min ha’teva. Thus we can understand quite well why all of the nations of the world, which are all part of teva, would naturally reject the “foreign body” of Klal Yisroel which does not fit in with the natural scheme of things!

See the rest here.

Procopius of Caesarea, in his “Secret History”, relates how Barbarians raided the Byzantine empire. “Peace and love! All we want is peace!” What kind of monster could oppose peace?! So, Justinian I paid the plundering Hun honeys some monies “to secure friendship”.

Yay! Peace is established. He probably told any skeptics to “spin like propellers”…

Oops. The Huns made another casual incursion! “Must have been a lower-level decision. Let’s pretend it didn’t happen, but give them a little more this time, just in case…”

To get more sweet tokens of uncomfortable “friendship”, the Huns attacked again! (A later Hun “German-Polish Non-Aggression Pact” comes to mind).

Not wanting things to deteriorate just when they were looking up, Justinian paid again. He didn’t want to lose face after the honor of his masterful peace-making! It’s only logical. Besides, what won’t a person do to hold on to a “friend“?!

Inspired to tears at observing this unwholesome “friendship”, other tribes got the unoriginal idea to also “make friends” with the Byzantine empire, with such friendly gestures as a raid or two here and there. To their friendless hearts’ great joy, their “friendly” overtures were graciously accepted. Justinian the Great shockingly paid them off, too. He was a just really great guy, with loads of friends; that’s why they called him “The Great“!

Just like the Israeli Peace Process.