[The following is based on the speech of HaRav Pam at the opening session of the American Agudas Yisroel convention twenty-four years ago. HaRav Yitzchok Silberstein, rav of Ramat Elchonon, said at the time that every avreich should read it. It is unfortunately very true still in our times. In a relatively few words, HaRav Pam zt"l describes the situation of the Jewish People as he saw it, and the task that lay before them. His efforts in his last years in the Shuvu educational system in Israel and elsewhere are clearly the result of this hashkofoh.]
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We must appreciate what Agudas Yisroel has done for us by organizing this convention. It has granted us the opportunity to reveal what is in our hearts, to converse together, and as friends discuss together the various problems of Klal Yisroel. We have a chance to propose methods of action and to foster improvements so that reverence for Heaven will be increased and the situation of the Jewish Nation be improved.
We thank and bless the Agudas Yisroel directorate, headed by its illustrious president, HaRav Moshe Sherer [shlita] zt"l, a person who is regularly granted Heavenly assistance. May Hashem bestow upon him perfect health, vitality, and longevity. May Agudas Yisroel be reinforced and achieve great accomplishments in all its future activities for the benefit of our people.
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The theme of this convention is "Fifty Years After The Holocaust." When one reflects on the Holocaust he cannot help but recollect the six million Jewish victims, among them a million children. One thinks about the sadistic atrocities, the inhuman acts, which it is difficult to believe ever happened. One recalls the gas chambers, the crematoria, and the rest.
It seems to me, however, that one point has not been sufficiently emphasized. This is the fact that during that period, Hashem's charon af was poured out on His beloved people, on the entire Am Yisroel. This Heavenly wrath itself showed that we had lost His love for us. His love, though still existing, was concealed from our view.
"`I have loved you,' says Hashem" (Malachi 1:2), we read in the haftorah for Toldos. Nevertheless, a Divine charon af fell upon us during the Holocaust. This itself, besides its results, was an incomparable tragedy. The charon af is still continuing: the "King's wrath was not pacified." We are witnesses to the murders, the threats, the dreadful condition in Eretz Yisroel, where Hashem's charon af is so evident.
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When The Shepherd Is Angry
The gemora (Bava Kammo 52a) remarks that when a shepherd is angry with his sheep he blinds the eyes of the leader of the sheep. Every day we see the blindness of the Israeli political leaders. They do not realize the terrible dangers hovering over the Jewish settlement in Eretz Yisroel and over Jews in the entire world. These are dangers to both our material and spiritual well being. When we see such blind leadership, we can feel how angry the Shepherd is with His flock, and that the charon af has not ceased.
We must, therefore, ask ourselves how we can appease HaKodosh Boruch Hu. How can we remove the charon af? His wrath is evident in our country too, in the terrible diseases afflicting people, in the tragic funerals of young people and of those in the prime of life. These are all signs of charon af that has not yet ceased.
What needs to be done? What can be done to appease HaKodosh Boruch Hu so that He will again show His love for us as He initially did?
We do not have any nevi'im now. If we did, they would reveal what is demanded from us. We have, however, no nevi'im, we have no urim vetumim, we have no baalei chalomos, people who have dreams in which Heaven divulges to them what has happened.
"And Mordechai perceived all that was done" (Esther 4:1). He knew that Klal Yisroel was endangered as a baal chalomos told him what had occurred (Rashi). By knowing the reason for the gezeira on the Jewish Nation, Mordechai was able to understand how to annul it. We do not have any baal chalomos. We do not know what to do. The very fact that we lack nevi'im and urim vetumim is itself part of the tragedy.
Fifty years ago, after the European churban, Hashem wanted to appease Klal Yisroel. He granted us some measure of possession of parts of Eretz Yisroel. This was a good sign. If we had merited it, a country based on the Torah would have been established. It would have been a kingdom of Hashem, with a Jewish nation that would shine forth. We would again have been privileged to have urim vetumim and a Beis Hamikdash. Unfortunately, our merits did not suffice. This is the current situation of Klal Yisroel, and it pains us very much.
The Child Is Not There
In parshas Vayeishev it says: "Reuven returned to the pit, and behold, Yosef was not in the pit. He rent his clothes . . . And he said, `The child is not there! And I, where shall I go?'" (Bereishis 37:29-30). Rashi explains that Reuven meant to say that he would be ruined on account of his father's suffering. Reuven agonized about where he could hide from his father's misery.
What exactly is our Father in Heaven's suffering? The novi Amos in the haftorah of Vayeishev uses harsh words in his penetrating rebuke, a reproof that pierces our hearts. "I also brought you up out of the land of Egypt, and led you forty years in the desert, to possess the land of the Emori" (Amos 2:10). Hashem says that He led us in the wilderness for forty years in order to bring us to the Holy Land. He gave us the Torah. He gave us a mishkan. He gave us mann — the "bread of the angels, man did eat" (Tehillim 78:25), a food saturated with the splendor of the Divine Presence, a food made in Heaven that prepared our hearts for the entry to the Holy Land.
"And I raised your sons to be prophets, and your young men to be nezirim" (Amos 2:11). I provided you with nezirim from among your young men. They were crowned with kedushoh. What did you do with them? "But you gave the nezirim wine to drink" (12). You made them drunkards. "And you commanded the nevi'im, saying: `Do not prophesy'" (ibid.). You silenced the nevi'im. You did not want to hear what Hashem was saying to you.
This is "our Father's suffering." HaKodosh Boruch Hu guided the footsteps of am Yisroel, starting from our Patriarchs. He set up the nation and made them fitting to be a Holy Nation in the Holy Land, with their nevi'im and nezirim. What is left now of all the nevi'im and nezirim? This is "our Father's suffering."
We see today that most Jewish children in Eretz Yisroel study in the Israeli public schools and we all know what type of education this is. The vast majority of the Jewish children there, holy offspring from whom nevi'im and nezirim should have come, are studying in public schools. We know well what `blossoms' from such education. This is "our Father's suffering."
How To Appease Our Father
How can our Father be appeased? What can we do to change our harsh decree and remove the charon af? How can we bring back both the endless love of HaKodosh Boruch Hu for am Yisroel and of am Yisroel for HaKodosh Boruch Hu?
Hashem, in His great kindness, has left us a way. This course of action is undoubtedly a chesed from Hashem. From within His charon af He showed us a way to appease Him.
The politics of the State of Israel is not in our hands. It is in the hands of people foreign to Yiddishkeit. The State of Israel's laws are opposed to the Torah and its mitzvos and we have no control over them. One avenue of activity has, however, been left for us: the children's education. In this area we have a free hand. We are unobstructed and may do what we want. We can take as many children as possible from heretical education and transfer them to institutes of Torah education. These children can grow up to be true gedolei Torah, tzadikim, nevi'im, and nezirim.
We have this capability and this is what HaKodosh Boruch Hu has shown us. Although other ways are closed to us, Hashem is, at it were, saying that He has left this way in our hands. He has left it in our power to do what we want and what we can. A spiritual revolution can be brought about in the entire nation. We are capable of doing it!
The same is true in America. How many Jewish children are lost to their heritage only because we lacked the necessary self- sacrifice to find them and register them in schools where they could study Hashem's Torah? We see that even with the little we are doing, those children who are given the chance are completely transformed. We are, however, not doing enough. We are satisfied that we have, boruch Hashem, a generation of bnei Torah, of yeshiva students, and of bnei aliya. But they are only a small minority of Klal Yisroel. What about the majority of our nation, the majority of Jewish children? We can make a change if we want!
Rashi in parshas Vayeishev (Bereishis 36:22) comments that Reuven said, "I am the eldest of them all. Only I will be blamed." Reuven put himself in jeopardy for Yosef since he knew that he would be held responsible. As the eldest, he would be blamed. This teaches us that those who themselves have gone astray will not be held responsible, since they are anyway far from Torah observance. The Torah world, the chareidi public, will be blamed — the "eldest of them all." If we want to appease HaKodosh Boruch Hu and reverse our harsh decree we must first remove "our Father's suffering" for "the child that is not there." This we have the means to accomplish.
Our options are great and consequential. Klal Yisroel has financial means. We, boruch Hashem, have exceptionally wealthy people among us. Hashem has given them this wealth in order to utilize it for Klal Yisroel, for Hashem's honor, and to return our lost sons to their roots. If we had utilized our resources, the picture of our nation today would have been completely different. Unfortunately, we have neither properly nor sufficiently utilized the potential we possess. We must exert ourselves to the fullest in this momentous mission of spiritual rescue.
"And With All Your Might" — Our Era's Test
If we reflect, we will discern that the test of that dreadful period, the era of the Holocaust, was "bechol nafshecho." Millions of Jews sanctified Hashem's name and accepted their harsh decree with faith and happiness. They sang ani ma'amin on their way to be slaughtered. That was the test of that period.
What is the test of our period? Our test is what Chazal (Brochos 54b) expound from, "And you shall love Hashem bechol me'odecho" — that we must love Hashem bechol momonecho — with all our wealth. If one really loves Hashem he does the unusual. "Love breaks down the line of the norm" (Bereishis Rabbah, Noach 11). If we will behave in this way then we will behold a different generation, a different Klal Yisroel. We will see once again the immense love of HaKodosh Boruch Hu for the Jewish Nation, a boundless love, a love that cannot be assessed.
I will conclude by mentioning the zechuyos of our nation. "Look from Heaven and see! Ribono Shel Olom, see that we have become an object of scorn and derision among the nations, we have been regarded as sheep led to slaughter, to be killed, destroyed, beaten, and humiliated" (Tachanun, ArtScroll translation). See what has happened to us, yet "nevertheless we have not forgotten Your name" — we have not severed ourselves from You. Any other nation would have rebelled against You, but we have not forgotten Your name.
The remnants who survived the great fire, the survivors, have immersed themselves in the immense endeavor of rebuilding Torah study and avodas Hashem with love, even after all they had undergone. "Nevertheless we have not forgotten You!"
"O Guardian of Yisroel, protect the remnant of Yisroel, look upon us with favor and be appeased with this poor generation, for there is no helper." We have no one to deliver us except You, and we want to appease you. "Look upon us with favor and be appeased with this poor generation, for there is no helper." Show us the radiance of Your face and let us speedily be privileged to see am Yisroel in its entire strength, glory, beauty, wealth, and joy.
HaRav Avrohom HaKohen Pam was rosh yeshivas Torah Vodaas and member of the Council of Torah Sages in the U.S.A. He was niftar on 28 Av, 5761.
