The retaliatory air strikes in Lebanon at the beginning of February on terrorist strongholds in the Baalebek Valley and power stations across the country were naturally the center of interest for many Israelis. All over the country people listened attentively to vivid reports of the damage and took pride in the "impressive attacks" of "our forces" who finally used the "military option" against the terrorists.
The excitement and intensive interest surprisingly encompassed even the Torah-observant. Many said, as they have on similar occasions, that although they have bitochon in Hashem, we dare not forget that a person must make hishtadlus, some effort on his own, and not "rely on a miracle."
That narrow crack in bitochon that speaks of "our duty to make hishtadlus" can widen significantly until some people claim that the soldiers and pilots are shelichim to help us fulfill the mitzvah of hishtadlus. This possibility then "obligates" us to be acquainted with the full breath of the military activities and to clarify all the details of this hishtadlus until we are zoche to understand the profound kavonos of the IDF Command.
The Chovos Halevovos (Sha'ar HaBitochon, 3) compares the way HaKodosh Boruch Hu guides His world to a man drawing water from a well. The person manually turns the pump handle, the handle turns a wheel, and the wheel draws up a pail of water, attached to a sturdy rope, from the well. A small child might mistakenly think the pail or rope is drawing the water. However, any mature person standing nearby who sees what is going on laughs at the child's lack of perception. He knows that the handle turns the wheels. Only from afar can one see the whole picture and realize that the man supplies the power and the rest of the process is only the means by which he draws the water.
The point of this story is that even one who believes in the Creator of the World is liable to fall prey to the false assumption that natural "partners" work together with Divine Providence. The Chovos Halevovos warns that "we should not [think that anything functions together with] Him, nor trust in [that additional power] nor in anyone. By [trusting in an additional source] one loses his trust in our Elokim . . . Everyone knows if two or more are appointed to a mission the result is failure. The trust in Hashem with a partner weakens our faith and is reason enough to withhold success, as is written, `Cursed is the person who trusts in man and makes flesh his arm and whose heart turns away from Hashem' (Yirmiyahu 17:5)."
"Son of man, they who inhabit the ruins of the land of Yisroel speak, saying, `Avrohom was one man, and yet he inherited the land, but we are many, so the land is given us for an inheritance'" (Yechezkel 33:24). Rashi (ibid.) writes, "This was one of the four things that R' Akiva expounded but R' Shimon ben Yochai, his talmid, did not agree with him. This is how R' Shimon would explain: Avrohom was commanded with only one mitzvah but inherited the land, we who were commanded with many mitzvos have surely been given the land for an inheritance" (Tosefta Sotah 6:5). The novi answers in the following pesukim since bnei Yisroel still commit terrible sins of theft, illicit relations, and murder, they have no right to inherit the land. The Radak (ibid.) cites Chazal (ibid.) that R' Akiva expounded the posuk differently: "If Avrohom, who only worshiped one G-d, inherited the land, we who worship many gods should surely inherit the land."
Someone once asked Maran HaRav Yitzchok Zeev Soloveitchik zt'l of Brisk to explain this ludicrous kal vochomer. How could these people say such nonsense even though they knew there is a Creator of the World and they even realized that HaKodosh Boruch Hu gave Eretz Yisroel to Avrohom.
The Brisker Rav answered: "Do not the datiim (i.e., the Mizrachi, the National Religious) think so today? They join shem Shomayim with the State and the army and make a kal vochomer that such a combination will surely succeed."
The NRP indeed uses a unique kal vochomer. For years they have been preaching to us: If the Torah itself "guards and saves us" surely "Torah and army" should guard and save us so much better. We must, they say, therefore set up yeshivos with combined Torah studies and military service and we will strengthen am Yisroel's security through such a kal vochomer.
One can reach such warped outlooks only after turning hishtadlus into a goal per se, something to be praised and revered, until it has become a national avoda zorah to be worshiped "together" with observing the Torah. Anyone who thinks this description is too extreme should visit a National Religious beit knesset in the kibbutz hadati where he will see a strange sight. During the entire tefillah and krias haTorah people talk and do not stand when obligated, but the moment the gabai announces the tefillah for Shalom Hamedinah the congregation becomes absolutely silent. They immediately stand erect and say the tefillah with heartfelt kavonos for the "kedushas HaMedinah," its strength and might.
These groups can in one breath belittle the yeshivos kedoshos, express amazement at those who devote their lives to the four amos of halocho and "dodge" military service, but do not see this as a contradiction to their religion.
They have formulated an outlook which praises those engaged in any hishtadlus but considers the precious bnei Torah as "not contributing to the nation's security."
Boruch Hashem, we have been zoche to have raised a generation that thoroughly realizes that it is Torah -- and Torah alone -- that guards and saves us. They understand that military hishtadlus is not a value of itself, but rather is like the wheel, the rope, and the pail in the moshol of the Chovos Halevovos. The spiritual power in whose merit we have been promised that Hashem with His abundant chesed will sustain us in the Holy Land is found only in the botei midrash of the yeshivos hakedoshos. "R' Yehoshua ben Levi said: `What does, "When our feet stood within your gates, O Yerushalayim" (Tehillim 122:2) mean? Who caused our feet to be victorious in war? It was the gates of Yerushalayim where people were engaged in Torah study'" (Makkos 10).
It is, unfortunately, doubtful that this awareness is instilled within us to the degree our gedolei Yisroel zt'l vyblc't demand. The end of the timeworn dispute about drafting yeshiva students which started when the State was founded does not seem to be on the horizon. We are not discussing how this military deferment actually takes place. Even when this deferment is based upon explicit orders from the Ministry of Security, or legislated by the Knesset, it will only help officially. As for the way the masses really feel and think: they refuse to sanction what they call the "draft dodging" of bnei Torah.
Of all the arguments focusing on the relationship between "religion and state," enlisting yeshiva students is the only one which repeatedly crops up, and the invective it engenders is tolerated by the public. Even nonreligious Jews who are prepared to accept legislation with limits because of Shabbos observance, kashrus regulations, and personal status, are not prepared to accept our stand about yeshiva students not serving in the army. Why?
Anyone who attempts to formulate a way for coexistence between chareidim and secular despite the acute political and social disagreements, sees how serious differences exist in so many areas. Observers also discern that in all these controversial topics there exists some crossover point based upon the mutual understanding that the other's claim is legitimate. Politicians often say: "I do not agree with you but I understand that you are convinced you are right and are acting according to your belief."
For example, Rightists realize the need for peace agreements and political quiet, and Leftists too understand that we must not totally disregard our national security nor withdraw from the territories without any conditions. Employers understand that workers have social rights, and similarly the heads of the Histadrut (the Israeli National Labor Union) understand that the owners move the wheels of economy. Although each side is sure of its righteousness and advocates according to its specific stand what should be done, it understands the other side.
In some instances of extreme differences in which each side entirely rejects the other's opinion, reality itself compels both sides to accept the other's stand to the point of at least admitting the other's right to think differently. Each one knows that just as he is resolved in his stand so is his opponent.
This, however, is only when there is a sort of balance between the opinions. With regard to drafting yeshiva students something unusual has happened: There is no balance between the two sides. Secular Jews do not even remotely comprehend our position. It is beyond even their imagination that anyone can truly believe that studying Torah protects us from our enemies. This seems to them so unrealistic that they feel certain we also do not really believe it.
On the other hand, they argue: You doubtless realize the need for maintaining an army (the scholarly among them have also learned the concept of the "need to make a hishtadlus"). If so, they say, let us sum up the differences and array them opposite each other. You, the chareidim, accept the need for an army but we, the secular Jews, do not accept the need of yeshivos with their "draft dodgers."
When we weigh things this way the secular side comes out on top. Their refusal to accept our legitimate demands is because they do not feel the power of our faith that without Torah institutions we will have nothing from our army and that even the best army would, chas vesholom, be defeated by the enemy.
In short, they know that we are aware that they do not accept our side at all, but they do not know that we too do not accept theirs. Our attitude to all their "hishtadlus" is as to an illusion which serves to hide the real power to protect and save the Jewish People living in Eretz Yisroel which is spiritual.
Many Mizrachi Jews are uncertain or vague about the balance between bitochon and hishtadlus, and these doubts and others bother them. On the other hand, the external success of military operations deceives them, appearing as though it really is "something" concrete and reliable.
The average secular citizen, however, has not the slightest doubt about yeshivos guarding him. Such an idea is absolutely absurd to him! He does not feel even the slightest internal conflict or pangs of doubt that perhaps yeshiva students guard over him, and not the contrary.
This makes things very difficult for us. HaRav Boruch Ber Lebowitz zt'l said that the power of heretics to defeat us in public campaigns is because they cling one hundred percent to their heresy. They have no doubt whatsoever about their "truth." But when we reply we do not always feel it as pure truth and sometimes we have doubts about to the righteousness of our ways and harbor thoughts that are not lesheim Shomayim.
Precisely because of this we must work hard to implant within ourselves and our children the truth of am Yisroel's existence. If not, we will continue to remain weaker in public debates, where we accept the fact that our brethren who have strayed from the Torah do not in the slightest accept our position, but they do not think that we do not accept theirs.
There is a rule in the beginning of Bovo Metzia that when one person claims something "belongs entirely to him" and the other claims that it "belongs entirely to him" it is divided evenly between the two. However, when one person initially says it "belongs entirely to him" but the other claims "only half belongs to him," the latter does not receive even a half.
Reflecting on what the Targum Yonoson ben Uziel writes on the song of Devorah Hanevi'ah shows us that Chazal see the history of the Jewish People as being constantly dependent upon our fulfilling the Torah. The Targum Yonoson throughout the shira repeats this theme: Abandoning the Torah bequeaths power to our enemies while studying Torah protects us.
"When beis Yisroel rebelled against the Torah, the nations came and chased them away from their cities. When they again observed the Torah they overcame their enemies in all the territories of Eretz Yisroel and the Sages once again sat in the beis midrash and publicly taught am Yisroel the Torah. In this way they blessed and praised HaKodosh Boruch Hu. Devorah Hanevi'ah said: `I praise Hashem, thank and bless, before the Elokim of Yisroel. When people transgress Your Torah, that You gave to Yisroel, the nations gain control over them, and when they return to it they gain control over their enemies'" (Shofetim 5:2- 4). "Devorah Hanevi'ah said: `I am a shaliach to praise the Sages of Yisroel. When misfortune occurred they did not stop studying Torah. It was fitting that they sat publicly in the beis midrash and taught the nation divrei Torah, to bless and thank Hashem'" (ibid., 9).
It is worthwhile reading the Targum Yonoson at length throughout the shira. We should, however, notice the foundation of faith that he repeats over and over. Whenever Yonoson ben Uziel, who was a tanna, points out the importance of studying Torah in general and particularly during a calamity and war time, he emphasizes it was done "publicly." They studied proudly, in front of everyone, as people who believed with all their hearts and souls that clinging to Torah study guards and protects am Yisroel. (See the letter of Maran HaRav Boruch Ber Lebowitz zt'l, printed in Bircas Shmuel, vol. 4, in which he explains that R' Akiva's answer to Papus expresses the principle that studying Torah while hiding is a bitul of Torah, and the obligation of studying Torah is through "assembling congregations of people to engage in Torah publicly" -- as the Targum Yonoson writes here too.)
Moreover, in the Tanna Devei Eliyahu we find that only studying Torah intensively, in great depth, and being mechadeish chidushei Torah protects the Jewish People during a misfortune and war.
"They chose new gods; then was war in the gates; was there a shield or spear seen among forty thousand in Yisroel" (Shofetim 5:8). The Tanna Devei Eliyahu (ch.
10) writes: "How fortunate is he who is mechadeish divrei Torah when he speaks. Anyone who is mechadeish divrei Torah when he speaks is similar to one who has heard from Heaven that HaKodosh Boruch Hu said: `My son, build for me a beis midrash since the great reward that I have in My treasure is yours and for you I save Yisroel, as is later written "They chose new gods; then was war in the gates; was there a shield or spear seen among forty thousand in Yisroel."' From here we are taught that when forty thousand of Yisroel gather together and go out to fight a war and among them is a pair of talmidei chachomim it is as though they hold a shield and a two- edged sword in their hands. Therefore it is written `was there a shield or spear seen among forty thousand in Yisroel.'"
The commentary Yeshuos Yaakov on the Tanna Devei Eliyahu cites in the name of R' Shmuel Laniado, the author of the Kli Yokor on the Nevi'im Rishonim, that: "As we find in Tanna Devei Eliyahu who explains `They chose new gods' that Hashem cherishes chidushei Torah and grants enormous reward to those who say who are mechadeish chidushei Torah, those of Yisroel who emerged and gathered together for this war were victorious in the merit of those engaged in Torah and saying chidushei Torah, and they relied on them as if they were holding a shield and a spear."
The Yismach Moshe, parshas Vezos Habrocho explains according to the Tanna Devei Eliyahu the Yerushalmi of Shekolim that says that the Oron with the broken luchos would go in front of Bnei Yisroel at war. The broken luchos recall the forgetting of Torah and the halochos forgotten during the mourning over Moshe's passing that were restored through pilpul. The broken luchos allude to the chidushei Torah -- in whose zechus they were victorious in war.
We therefore see that studying Torah, in whose merit we succeed in war, is not just studying daf yomi and a few paragraphs of halocho after davening (although we do not, cholila, intend to belittle this type of study for someone who is busy earning a living and adheres to the obligation of setting fixed times of Torah study). Only intense study, profound analysis, careful clarification of the sugya, and the drawing of chidushei Torah from the depth of the Sea of the Talmud, guard against our enemies and the dangers of war. "They chose new gods; then was war in the gates; was there a shield or spear."
Any ben Torah who labors over understanding his rav's shiur and clarifies the chidushei Torah in the sugya he is studying, is waving a shield and spear in the face of our enemies who attempt to destroy us. Any scholarly ma'arochoh in a Rambam annuls a plot of the Hizbullah, and every chabura said in the kollel destroys the infrastructure of terror. Neither heavy bombing nor assault helicopters will deliver us from our enemies. Only the pilpulim of the yeshiva and kollel students will rescue us.
The path of life which Chazal have instructed us to follow and through which we will be saved from our many enemies, runs true throughout our history. We must internalize its truth. We must have tangible faith in it and allow it to become a reality of our life.
When several years ago Maran the Rosh Yeshiva shlita announced a number of times that if, chas vesholom there is a gezeira of drafting yeshiva students we should all leave Eretz Yisroel, he meant that without Torah am Yisroel cannot exist. We would leave for two reasons: First, we must ensure that the Torah will be observed in another place, and second, because without yeshivos and kollelim, Eretz Yisroel will become a dangerous place in which to live. Every believing Jew, whether or not he is a yeshiva student, must firmly realize that our precarious position in Eretz Yisroel, as a sheep surrounded by seventy wolves, is guaranteed only through Torah.
Maran shlita tried to clarify to us that a Jew who clings to the foundations of our faith should have the same attitude towards the closing of the yeshivos as a secular Jew would following the decision of a prime minister to dismantle the army, disarm the soldiers, and leave the borders unguarded. Surely any sensible secular citizen would immediately flee Eretz Yisroel after such an insane decision. For us, silencing the sound of Torah study constitutes a similar, real danger and genuine concern.
We must realize the contribution of those who study Torah to guarding the existence of am Yisroel. It is important to emphasize repeatedly that we must be careful not to feel subconsciously (and therefore not to broadcast outwardly) that both sides are equal: bnei Torah guard with their Torah and soldiers guard with their weapons. We should not feel that there are two sides who are "partners" in guarding the land and that we are merely claiming "half is ours" in guarding am Yisroel. Absolutely not!
Those involved in security hishtadlus are merely like the rope and pail of the Chovos Halevovos. Although perhaps they give an illusion of guarding us, the genuine guards are those who study Torah. "It is entirely ours."
"Make me wiser from my enemies" (Tehillim 119:98). We must learn from the great "emunah" of those clinging to the feeling of military power. Let us consider their terror in trying to stop any Torah lecturer from reaching an army base. They are afraid that he will perhaps convince someone to leave the army and go to a yeshiva. By their lights this will weaken the defense of the State. We should see how agitated they are about the decline in motivation in the army and issues of military capability. According to their outlook in life they are right. Anyone who believes that soldiers and weapons protect those who live in Eretz Yisroel must be concerned to ensure the country's military might.
As believers the sons of believers in the power of Torah we must be delighted with the blossoming of the yeshivos and the increase of those studying Torah. Every "rise in the number of those recruited" to the Torah institutions, besides spreading the Torah's radiance and widening the boundaries of kedusha, allows every believing Jew to sleep more soundly at night and to feel more protected since the power of the real "shield and spear" of klal Yisroel is enhanced.
Just as any sensible person will feel no need to express the same gratitude to the surgeon as to the surgical knife he holds, just as no one will equate the water drawer to the pail, the builder with the building tool, nor the cook to the pot, as "partners" in their respective achievements -- so too we must not join any earthly power to the exclusive effectiveness of Torah institutions in guarding am Yisroel.
