Innovation, Conservatism, and Tradition – Lesson 10
This transcript was generated automatically using artificial intelligence. There may be inaccuracies in the transcribed content and in speaker identification.
🔗 Link to the original lecture
🔗 Link to the transcript on Sofer.AI
Table of Contents
- The definition of Modern Orthodoxy and interpretive conservatism
- American Modern Orthodoxy and the concealment of value change
- Fear of Reform and the difference between the U.S. and Israel
- Haredism as a combination of anti-Zionism and anti-modernity
- The parable from Even HaAzel: similarity is not transitive
- Religious Zionism “with a hyphen” as plain-sense conservatism
- Secular Zionism as the basis for Modern Orthodoxy “without a hyphen”
- Reservations about turning the state into religion, state prayers, and flags in the synagogue
- The rabbi of Ponevezh: a flag, Hallel, and Tachanun
- The confusion in Israel and shifting the line of dispute from Zionism to modernity
- Elections to the Chief Rabbinate as an example of conceptual distortion
- The suppression of Modern Orthodox identity and labeling it as “lite” / neo-Reform
- The Chief Rabbinate as a secular institution and why there is no need for it
- “Great Torah figures,” rabbinic leadership in Religious Zionism, and criticism of politicians
- The need for Torah scholars and for building an identity and a theory
- Rabbis of Beit Hillel, first-order and second-order reasoning, and criticism of the labels “rabbi” / “female rabbi”
- His personal position: secular Zionism, rejection of the beginning of redemption, and doubt about the commandment of conquering the Land
- Summary of the whole move and the intention to “make order out of the mess”
Summary
General Overview
The speaker defines Modern Orthodoxy as “interpretive conservatism” that is willing to ground halakhic change not only in factual change but also in value change. He argues that American Modern Orthodoxy usually does not admit value change, and therefore wraps it in factual arguments and ancient sources so as not to appear Reform. He distinguishes between Religious Zionism and Modern Orthodoxy, and claims that in Israel there is a deliberate identity confusion that subordinates most of the religious public to the framework of “Religious Zionism” and removes Modern Orthodox identity from the map. He presents two forms of Zionism: Religious Zionism “with a hyphen,” which relies on the commandment of settling the Land as plain-sense conservatism, and “secular Zionism” as a modern value of nationality that can exist in a religious Jew without turning the state into a religious category. He concludes that the real line of dispute is the attitude toward modernity, not the attitude toward Zionism, and he criticizes the de facto Haredi rabbinic leadership within Religious Zionism and the institution of the Chief Rabbinate as a secular mechanism that enthrones a conservative halakhic leadership.
The definition of Modern Orthodoxy and interpretive conservatism
The speaker says that the defining feature of Modern Orthodoxy is its attitude toward modernity, expressed in an interpretive conservatism that is willing to make interpretive moves on the basis of values and not only on the basis of facts. He distinguishes between interpretive conservatism based only on factual changes and modern conservatism that recognizes value changes as a basis for halakhic change. He argues that conservatism based only on factual interpretations can also be Haredi or non-modern conservatism, so the crucial distinction is whether one accepts value change as a legitimate logic within halakhic conservatism.
American Modern Orthodoxy and the concealment of value change
The speaker argues that according to his definition, the American Modern Orthodoxy of the Yeshiva University school does not really fit the definition, because it is not willing to accept value change as a basis for changing Jewish law and sees that as Reform. He says they are alert to factual changes and their consequences, and try to base changes on factual change while leaning on older sources, as in the example of Meiri about non-Jews who behave morally, which they translate into a factual change rather than a value change. He adds that although in the phenomenology of their arguments you do not see value-based arguments, in practice they are often driven by value change but do not admit it, and so they “plant” the value inside factual arguments in order to avoid the Reform label. He describes a situation in which many people simply act in the way that seems right to them without giving a detailed accounting, and the avoidance of self-accounting is meant to prevent them from “standing in front of the mirror” and recognizing that they are Modern Orthodox in his sense.
Fear of Reform and the difference between the U.S. and Israel
The speaker argues that in the United States, the accusation of being “Reform” is more acute and more troubling than in Israel, and therefore there is a strong urge to distinguish yourself from Reform Jews. He says that in Israel, Reform is an anecdote, not a meaningful option on the scene, so it is less frightening to speak in language that sounds Reform. He explains that this American pressure leads people to hide value-based arguments behind sober conservatism and factual reasoning.
Haredism as a combination of anti-Zionism and anti-modernity
The speaker defines Haredism as resting on two assumptions that have no necessary connection to one another: opposition to Zionism and opposition to modernity. He therefore concludes that non-Haredi Judaism can be built from two independent poles: Religious Zionism, which opposes anti-Zionism, and Modern Orthodoxy, which opposes anti-modernity. He says that in Israel the two currents are identified with one another at the level of identity, even though there is no necessary connection between them, and that this creates broad confusion.
The parable from Even HaAzel: similarity is not transitive
The speaker brings a parable from Even HaAzel, Rabbi Isser Zalman Meltzer, in the laws of Sabbath regarding the category of building in Maimonides, as also cited in Kehillot Yaakov on Sabbath in the section about building with utensils. He presents the definition of building as gathering parts that create a functional cavity, and shows that two different derivative labors resemble the primary labor from different angles: making cheese curds resembles it in gathering parts without a cavity, and a tent resembles it in creating a cavity without gathering parts. He stresses that the two derivative labors do not resemble one another, even though both resemble building, and he applies this to the fact that Religious Zionism and Modern Orthodoxy resemble each other only in that they are not Haredi, but in essence they do not resemble one another at all.
Religious Zionism “with a hyphen” as plain-sense conservatism
The speaker argues that classic Religious Zionist justifications rely on the commandment to settle the Land, conquer the Land, commandments dependent on the Land, and connection to the Jewish people, and they present Zionism as the correct and straightforward application of the Torah’s commands. He says there is no conservative interpretation here that emerges from changing circumstances or newly emerging values, but rather plain attachment to Jewish law as it always was, and therefore this is actually “to the right of Haredism” in terms of adherence to Jewish law. He says it is the Haredim who need interpretive moves and arguments in order to justify not joining the Zionist project, because most of Haredism agrees in principle that such a commandment exists, aside from a negligible minority such as the author of Megillat Esther and the Satmar position regarding Rabbenu Chaim Cohen in Tosafot.
Secular Zionism as the basis for Modern Orthodoxy “without a hyphen”
The speaker presents an alternative Zionist rationale based on the Springtime of Nations, on the values of nationality, sovereignty, independence, statehood, and national identity, and says that this is the rationale of secular Zionism, not Religious Zionism. He says that he is “a religious Jew and a secular Zionist,” and explains that his Zionism does not depend on commandments but on an external modern value that entered his world and affects his decisions. He says that the Torah, in its plain sense, does not contain a value of modern sovereignty, “to be a free people in our land,” and that attempts to extract that are just clever homiletics. Therefore, Zionism based on modern nationalism specifically reflects Modern Orthodoxy, which brings external values into the religious world. He describes cooperation with the state and army service as a civic obligation of loyalty and mutual rights and duties, not as a religious commandment of the beginning of redemption or “helping Israel against an enemy,” even if one can formulate religious parallels for it.
Reservations about turning the state into religion, state prayers, and flags in the synagogue
The speaker says that prayer for the welfare of the state, linking the state to the army and to Hallel, and flags in the synagogue “give him the creeps” and feel to him like “a prayer for the welfare of the emperor.” He argues that bringing the state into the religious dimension is dangerous and liable to lead to a troubling fascism, and he stresses that his identification with the state is very strong, but is not part of his religious dimension. He adds that he does not recite prayer when going out to war because he does not think the Holy One, blessed be He, intervenes in the world, but if he did think that, he would ask for help out of a desire to live and protect independence, not because of any holiness of the state.
The rabbi of Ponevezh: a flag, Hallel, and Tachanun
The speaker tells a Bnei Brak joke about the rabbi of Ponevezh, who hung out a flag on Independence Day but did not say Hallel and also did not say Tachanun, and he explains that he sees in this response a serious position of being “a Zionist like Ben-Gurion.” He interprets this as secular Zionism: civic joy over the existence of a state and gratitude, without turning the day into a religious holiday that obligates Hallel, and at the same time without saying Tachanun because it is a joyous day. He compares this to communal days such as “Purim Casablanca,” where a community establishes a day of celebration and perhaps omits Tachanun, and notes that one could also say Hallel from a secular Zionist perspective as thanksgiving for rescue, but the rabbi of Ponevezh chose to express the civic character by not saying Hallel.
The confusion in Israel and shifting the line of dispute from Zionism to modernity
The speaker argues that in Israel there is no Modern Orthodox identity on the table, because everyone non-Haredi is placed under the heading of Religious Zionism, and this confusion serves operatives and rabbis who want to preserve a power base. He says that the argument of “Religious Zionism versus Haredism” is effectively dead, because today there is no practical connection between Haredism and anti-Zionism beyond words, and the Haredim relate to the state much like Religious Zionists do. He proposes that the real watershed should be around the attitude to modernity: Modern Orthodox versus non-modern Orthodox, not around the question of whether you are Zionist. He argues that the rabbinic leadership of Religious Zionism is Haredi “in every sense” except for saying Hallel on Independence Day, and therefore it is not convenient for them if the Religious Zionist identity splits into “Religious Zionism” versus “Modern Orthodox.”
Elections to the Chief Rabbinate as an example of conceptual distortion
The speaker describes the lament in the Religious Zionist press after Rabbi Lau and Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef were elected, and argues that the analysis that “Religious Zionism did not unite” is nonsense, because the confrontation was not about Zionism but about conservatism versus openness. He says that in terms of conservatism, almost all the Religious Zionist candidates were Haredi in practice, and only Rabbi David Stav was on the relatively Modern Orthodox side, so it is no surprise that the conservative coalition won. He adds that saying Hallel on Independence Day is not a relevant measure of Zionism in this system, and that the real issues are agunot, conversions, the status of women in the religious courts, the sale permit (heter mekhira), and the like.
The suppression of Modern Orthodox identity and labeling it as “lite” / neo-Reform
The speaker argues that Haredi leadership, both in Haredism itself and in Religious Zionism, wants to preserve the field as a dichotomy of “Haredi or lite,” and to attach labels like neo-Reform in order to delegitimize a third option that is faithful to Jewish law. He says that in his view most of the religious public is in practice in the Modern Orthodox zone, but without a defined identity and rabbinic leadership for this approach, the public remains unable to choose it consciously. He says that Gush Etzion, Alon Shevut, and their surroundings did not develop an independent identity and continue to speak in a Religious Zionist discourse, and in that way they are “shooting themselves, and all of us, in the foot.”
The Chief Rabbinate as a secular institution and why there is no need for it
The speaker argues that there is no need for a Chief Rabbinate, because “make for yourself a rabbi” always existed without such an institution, and today one can ask rabbis all over the world through instant communication. He argues that almost no one asks the Chief Rabbinate anything, that its standing comes by force of secular law, and that on the Torah level they are “third-tier people at best.” He blames the secular public for enthroning conservative and fossilized rabbis, and adds that this is not only a coalition matter but a deep ethos in which “a rabbi is Haredi,” while a Religious Zionist rabbi is perceived as a toy, and he describes his own difficulty in freeing himself from that perception.
“Great Torah figures,” rabbinic leadership in Religious Zionism, and criticism of politicians
The speaker says that the forums advising politicians in Religious Zionism are always rabbis, and he describes Rabbi Lior, Rabbi Melamed, Rabbi Yaakov Ariel, and Rabbi Druckman as “a collection of Haredim who say Hallel.” He argues that they established themselves as leadership because the Religious Zionist idea, in his understanding, is Haredi in essence, just applied to settling the Land, whereas a Modern Orthodox person would not see them as a direction to follow. He gives Idit Silman as an example of someone who in practice belongs to Modern Orthodoxy but breaks under the pressures of a Haredi-style Religious Zionist identity. He describes Bennett’s success as the ability to represent a Modern Orthodox public politically, and the war against him as a war against the appearance of an identity that threatens the Haredi hegemony within Religious Zionism.
The need for Torah scholars and for building an identity and a theory
The speaker agrees with the claim that a significant number of genuine Torah scholars is needed within the Modern Orthodox public in order for this identity to become established and influential. He says that the difficulty stems from the multiplicity of life-fronts that weakens specialization, but argues that the way forward is to define the concepts and formulate a theory that will enable people to identify themselves with this as a legitimate option. He refers to the proposal to establish Modern Orthodox yeshivot with a demand of “you shall meditate in it day and night,” and says that in principle he accepts it.
Rabbis of Beit Hillel, first-order and second-order reasoning, and criticism of the labels “rabbi” / “female rabbi”
The speaker estimates that some of the rabbis of Beit Hillel belong in this area, but argues that they did not define their identity and theory sufficiently, and that their responsa rely on “second-order” precedents. He says that he wrote about “first-order and second-order” reasoning against an answer by the rabbis of Beit Hillel on an orphan girl saying Kaddish, and adds that he opposes joining groups of rabbis and does not accept granting the titles “rabbi” and “female rabbi” without a minimal threshold of knowledge and halakhic skill. He warns that this compromise stems from shortage but exacts a heavy price, and suggests that better to have little and not compromise.
His personal position: secular Zionism, rejection of the beginning of redemption, and doubt about the commandment of conquering the Land
The speaker sharpens the point that he is in favor of observing the commandments dependent on the Land, but says that his Zionism does not depend on that, and that even without it he would be just as Zionist. He rejects the thought-world of the “beginning of redemption” and the “footsteps of the Messiah” as slogans people do not understand, and argues that attempts to identify political processes from the prophets are “somewhere between magic and divination.” He says he is not sure there is a commandment to conquer the Land, notes Nachmanides against Maimonides, and adds that even if there is such a commandment, the State of Israel does not fulfill it because it does not act in the name of Jewish law and is not a “Jewish state” in that sense.
Summary of the whole move and the intention to “make order out of the mess”
The speaker says that the drift into politics is really the essence and necessary implication of the whole series, whose purpose is to make order within the “deliberate mess” that prevents Modern Orthodox identity from emerging and being present in the discourse. He concludes that the analysis is meant to bring this possibility out of vagueness, so that people can choose it consciously and legitimately.
Full Transcript
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay, let’s begin. Last time we finally arrived at a definition of Modern Orthodoxy, and my basic claim was — without going back over the details — my basic claim was that what defines Modern Orthodoxy is its attitude toward modernity, not surprisingly. But translated into the map I drew with the swimsuits and everything we discussed afterward, then basically Modern Orthodoxy is interpretive conservatism that is willing to make interpretive moves on a value basis too, not only on a factual basis. Interpretive conservatism that relies only on factual interpretations, on factual changes, can be either Haredism or non-modern conservatism. Modern conservatism is distinctive not because it makes conservative interpretive moves — because that exists in the other conservatism too — but because it makes them on a value basis as well and not only on the basis of… And I said that after this definition — and again, I’m saying this very briefly — after this definition I began, I said that I had three remarks that basically complete this whole move. The first remark I actually already said at the end of last time. I said that according to my definition of Modern Orthodoxy, it seems to me that American Modern Orthodoxy does not really fit this definition. And apparently the expression or term “Modern Orthodoxy” is drawn from there. So it sounds a bit strange that I take a term that comes from there and define it in a way that does not fit the source it came from. But I answered that. I said that basically in — again, of course these are all generalizations — but basically in Modern Orthodoxy from the school of Yeshiva University, for example, there the outlook is basically — I called it sober interpretive conservatism as opposed to fossilized conservatism, which is the Haredi kind — but not Modern Orthodox in the sense that I’m defining it. They are not willing to accept value change as a basis for changing Jewish law. They will generally treat something like that as Reform. What they do is simply keep their eyes open to factual changes, or to value changes and their factual consequences, as we saw in Meiri regarding non-Jews who behave morally, but from the standpoint of the logic of change, that is a factual change, not a value change. And they try — American Modern Orthodox thinkers try — to base changes, insofar as they support change, on a factual change with older sources, meaning to rely on earlier sources. They won’t accept a claim of “it just doesn’t fit” or a claim that says the value changed and therefore something here has to change. And I brought the example of secular courts, where I personally took the hits from them for saying that. But in general it seems to me that this is an approach — American Modern Orthodox — a conservative approach, conservative but not modern in my definition. So why do I still use that term? Two reasons. First, terminology is not what matters, it’s semantics. Call it something else as far as I’m concerned. What matters to me is just to see what options exist on the map. What you call them — whether you call it Modern Orthodox or not — call it whatever you want, it doesn’t really matter, so this is not an important question. But there is another answer here that does touch somewhat on the essence, on sociology and on the essence. And that is that I think that many times the American Modern Orthodox person is in fact aware of value changes and is willing, or does use them, to shape his halakhic worldview. He just does not admit it. He does not admit it outwardly, but it seems to me that often he does not admit it even to himself, because it looks Reform to him. So he can’t do that. So what does he do? He plants it inside existing sources and tries somehow to organize some kind of factual interpretation, some sort of factual conservatism, to justify his halakhic approach, when in fact… when in fact at the base there is some kind of value claim. I won’t go back to the examples again — I gave examples of these things, like nullifying idolatry, saving a non-Jew on the Sabbath, where we hang things on all sorts of reasons. I’m not convinced those are really the reasons. Those are reasons that are stated only because people are not willing to admit that this is Modern Orthodoxy in my sense. That’s why I say that even American Modern Orthodoxy — true, in its phenomenology, in the arguments you hear there, you won’t see arguments of the type I characterized here as Modern Orthodox — but I do think it’s there. And it’s there because they are not willing to accept such a model as an Orthodox conservative model, so they wrap it in arguments on a factual basis. But I don’t really believe them that that’s the whole story. Often, by the way, the Modern Orthodox person doesn’t engage in arguments at all. He just behaves the way he thinks is right, without engaging in any detailed self-accounting of what it’s based on and which changes yes and which changes no. People hardly deal with that. They just go with it. When you do make the calculation for yourself of what such an approach could be based on, I think the real accounting is Modern Orthodox in the sense I’m talking about. And the fact that they don’t make that accounting is exactly so they won’t have to stand in front of the mirror and discover about themselves that they are Modern Orthodox in my sense. They prefer to sell themselves the line that they’re still Modern Orthodox in their own sense. It’s more comfortable; it looks less Reform. And you understand that in the U.S., the accusation that you’re Reform is harsher and more bothersome than it is here in the land. Here in Israel, Reform is an anecdote. It’s not really an option that’s on the map in the arena. So calling someone Reform isn’t really that troubling, not really that interesting, at least not with the same intensity as in the U.S. In the U.S., the distinction you have to make between yourself and Reform is much more acute on the practical level. It’s much more important to people to distinguish themselves from Reform than it is here in Israel. And therefore I assume people are less comfortable speaking in a language that sounds Reform, so they hide it behind arguments of conservatism, what I called some kind of sober conservatism. So that was the first remark. The second remark brings me back to the question of Religious Zionism. I’ll remind you again of what I’ve mentioned more than once already: Haredism assumes two things that seemingly have no connection between them — opposition to Zionism, to establishing a national home for the Jews in the Land of Israel, at least in the present format, and opposition to modernity. Two ideas that have no necessary connection, but both were adopted by the central Haredi stream. So non-Haredi Judaism can therefore be at least of two kinds: either someone who opposes the first component, anti-Zionism — meaning Religious Zionism — or someone who opposes the second component, opposition to modernity — meaning modern Zionism, or Modern Orthodoxy, sorry. Modern Orthodoxy and Religious Zionism are exactly the two poles opposite to Haredism; each one opposes a different aspect out of the two that characterize Haredism. But in such a structure, as I said, we see very clearly why there shouldn’t be any connection between these two streams. Other than the fact that they are not Haredi — but one is not Haredi because of aspect A and the other is not Haredi because of aspect B — there is no reason to identify these two streams, as in fact happens in Israel. In Israel these two streams are identified; they do not distinguish themselves from one another, at least at the identity level, and therefore an enormous amount of confusion is created here, even though there is no connection between the two things. I’m just thinking now, to demonstrate the logic of the matter, of a very interesting piece by Even HaAzel, Rabbi Isser Zalman Meltzer. He wrote an article, and he returns to it afterward in the laws of Sabbath in Even HaAzel, Laws of Sabbath. And Kehillot Yaakov cites this article — Kehillot Yaakov on Sabbath, on building with utensils. He has a long section there on building with utensils. Even HaAzel explains various strange phenomena in Maimonides’ category of building. He says that basically the definition of building is someone who gathers parts and creates from them a cavity, because what is a house? When I build a house, I take bricks, boards, gather them, join them to one another, and create some kind of functional cavity — a dwelling, a house within which I function, something one can function inside. So basically, building a house in its fundamental definition is gathering parts in order to create a functional cavity. Okay? The terminology is mine, of course, not Rabbi Isser Zalman’s, but that’s what he writes. Now, the derivative labors of building, he argues — and you can see this in Maimonides too — are divided into two kinds, two types. One derivative is gathering parts, gathering parts that does not create a functional cavity. For example, making cheese. When you make cheese, basically you gather the parts of the cheese and form them into a solid block. That is basically a derivative of building, that’s what Maimonides writes, and apparently that is Torah-level, not rabbinic, even though no cavity is created here. The structure created here doesn’t resemble a house, but there is still a gathering of parts and the creation of some whole that is not a cavity. Okay? That’s one kind of derivative. Another kind of derivative is creating a tent. A tent is not really made of parts; I put a blanket above on poles or something like that, and the cavity created under that blanket is called a tent. It is forbidden on a Torah level to do that on the Sabbath; it is a derivative of building. There is a temporary tent, a permanent tent — we won’t get into the details. But in principle that’s the derivative of the second type. What is the relation between these two derivatives? There is no similarity between them. None at all. Meaning, the tent is a derivative of building because there too a functional cavity is created, but there is no gathering of parts. In making cheese there is gathering of parts, but no functional cavity is created. Each one resembles the primary labor of building from another aspect. Since building contains two aspects, each of these resembles building in a different aspect, and therefore both resemble building — but this is not transitive. Meaning, they don’t resemble one another. Both of them resemble a third thing, but there is no resemblance between them. Because one resembles that thing in aspect A; the other resembles that thing in aspect B. So between the first and the second there is no similarity at all, even though both resemble the same thing. They resemble it from different aspects. So I think that’s a good parable for the logic I’m talking about here. Although we are used to identifying Religious Zionism with Modern Orthodoxy, we are used to identifying them only because both are non-Haredi Judaism or non-Haredi religiosity. But when you look at the similarity between the two, there is no similarity, none at all. These are two independent ideas. One opposes Haredism because it is Zionist; the other opposes Haredism because it is modern. There is no connection between these two things. I’ll sharpen that more in a moment. There was a question here earlier that suggested the two can be identified. In my opinion they can’t, and I’ll identify the distinction in a somewhat sharper way in a moment. What happens in the Religious Zionist position? Notice: a Religious Zionist position — I’m speaking now about someone who is not Haredi because he supports Zionist moves, the establishment of a state, regardless of his attitude toward modernity. He could also be Modern Orthodox — meaning, these two groups, that doesn’t mean there can’t be someone who belongs to both. I’m only saying that on the principled level there is no connection between these two groups. Belonging to the first and belonging to the second are independent. They don’t contradict each other, but they are independent. You can choose independently whether to belong to group A and whether to belong to group B. There is no connection between them. Now what happens? When I look at Religious Zionist rationales, those rationales are usually rationales that are not even conservative interpretation. They are nothing on the map according to the map I drew here. What is Religious Zionism based on? Okay? What do Religious Zionist thinkers or Religious Zionist people base their view on? Very simple. There is a commandment to conquer the Land, to settle the Land, commandments dependent on the Land. I don’t know, identification or connection with the Jewish people — these can also be ideas less directly tied to Jewish law. But all these ideas are straightforward Torah and halakhic ideas. And in the end classic Religious Zionism argues that this is the correct application of the Torah’s commands in our time — not in our time, really, but in general — and even without conservative interpretation. It is simply conservatism. It is simply a plain-sense reading of the Torah. There is a commandment to conquer the Land of Israel and settle it as a people, so we conquer the Land of Israel and settle it as a people. That’s all. An application of a Torah-level positive commandment, like positive commandment number 4 in Nachmanides. Maimonides does not accept it, but never mind. They believe there is such a positive commandment, and therefore one must settle the Land. So notice that the basis for Religious Zionism is not something that has only now been renewed. There is no need here for conservative interpretation. I do not need to change some halakhic principle because of different circumstances or changed values. Nothing. I simply implement what the Torah has always told me. In principle we should have done this also in the 12th century, the 13th, the 14th, the 15th, and every century until today. All of them. Maybe there was no practical opportunity, maybe there was and we were negligent — it doesn’t matter. But nothing changed here that says, yes, Jewish law once said this, but today we need to apply it differently because the circumstances changed. There is no such argument at the basis of Religious Zionism. The argument at the basis of Religious Zionism is a plain-sense conservative argument, classic conservative. It’s not even interpretive conservatism; it’s plain-sense conservatism. Nothing changed — one simply has to implement what the Torah expects of us, that’s all. Therefore arguments of this type are not connected in any way to Modern Orthodoxy, in any way. Not only are they not connected to Modern Orthodoxy; they’re not even connected to interpretive conservatism. They are actually found even to the right of Haredism in the sense of attitude toward Jewish law — they can be even to the right of Haredism in the sense of attitude toward Jewish law. On the contrary, this is ultra-Haredism. We go on implementing — or are careful to implement — the instructions of Jewish law exactly as they were written from time immemorial, as they always would have been binding, as is. We keep walking around with a swimsuit. Exactly the same thing. Despite opposition and everything else, it doesn’t matter. We fulfill the Torah’s command without taking changed circumstances into account, not because of changed circumstances. It’s not only not because of changed circumstances — on the contrary, sometimes it is even against changed circumstances. Therefore what exists in Religious Zionism on the map I drew here is not even interpretive conservatism, let alone Modern Orthodox. It is plain-sense conservatism. It is simply adherence to halakhic values, that’s all. And Torah values, perhaps broader, not only halakhic, never mind. So that’s why I argued earlier that there is no connection between a Religious Zionist outlook and Modern Orthodoxy. Again, there may be a person who is both Religious Zionist and Modern Orthodox, but there is no connection between them. The idea of Religious Zionism is an idea of plain-sense conservatism at its root. Now let’s think for a moment what happens with someone who joins the Zionist movement or supports Zionism not because of the halakhic basis I described here, but as part of the Springtime of Nations. Just as every people wants sovereignty, wants independence, wants a territory of its own, a state of its own, so too the Jewish people deserves and wants and has similar aspirations, like every other people, to establish its own independent state for its own people in its own place, in its own land, and so on. That is Modern Orthodoxy in… actually I’d say not even Modern Orthodoxy — that is secular Zionism. It is not Religious Zionism; it is secular Zionism. The Springtime of Nations may have influenced and awakened the Religious Zionists to fulfill the commandment they are supposed to fulfill, but it plays no part in the rationale for their view. It may have had some influence, because secular Zionism started this whole matter, and secular Zionism was certainly influenced by the Springtime of Nations and not by the commandment to conquer the Land — or not only by the commandment to conquer the Land; there were religious influences in that period too. In any case, the point is that a rationale based on national values, on newly emerged values, is actually the rationale of secular Zionism. It is not the rationale of Religious Zionism. Therefore Religious Zionism is not only unrelated to Modern Orthodoxy; it is unrelated even to interpretive conservatism. It is plain-sense conservatism. On the contrary, plain-sense conservatism that accuses the Haredim of putting on a padded coat, of taking off the swimsuit and putting on a padded coat. Why are you not fulfilling it? There is a commandment to conquer the Land and settle it. How is it that you don’t fulfill that? There is a claim against them. The Haredim will need interpretation to explain why they are not fulfilling that commandment, because they too agree there is such a commandment. Aside from a negligible minority — yes, the famous Megillat Esther, about whom Satmar already wrote that he… Rabbenu Chaim Cohen in Tosafot, who says that nowadays there isn’t… he says this Chaim Cohen is an erring student. So the overwhelming majority of Haredism certainly agrees with the halakhic view of Religious Zionism. And specifically they are the ones making interpretive moves and considerations of one kind or another to explain why nevertheless at this time they do not join the project and do not fulfill this commandment. But in that sense Religious Zionism is more fundamentalist than Haredism, more tightly attached to the ancient values in a simplistic way, without interpretations, much more than anti-Zionist Haredism. That’s a little surprising, but if you think about it, you’ll see it’s clearly so. The Haredim are the ones innovating an approach here. Now of course there are also aspects of cooperation with secular people and so on — there it’s less clear on the side of Religious Zionism — but the Zionist move itself, of establishing a sovereign state here and gathering the Jewish people into the Land of Israel and fulfilling commandments dependent on the Land and all that, is basic ABCs of keeping Jewish law in its plain sense. Anyone who doesn’t do that is the one who needs to give reasons and bring interpretations and explanations that will explain why he is nevertheless faithful to Jewish law, and under present circumstances does not fulfill its command as is in the simple way. That’s one side. Now, as I said earlier, there can be another rationale for Zionism, and that is the rationale of secular Zionism, which says: there is the Springtime of Nations, peoples have national aspirations, the Jewish people also has national aspirations, and like everyone else, we too have a right to and deserve and should aspire to realize our sovereignty and independence in an independent state in the Land of Israel, which is simply our heritage, independently of religion — historically this is our homeland, that’s where our sentiment points. So that is the aspiration of secular Zionism. Now, I wrote several times — yes, this was in some interview once in the magazine Sheva, when they interviewed me — I said that I am a religious Jew and a secular Zionist. Afterward someone remarked to me that this was taken from Yeshayahu Leibowitz; I hadn’t even remembered that, but apparently I took it from him. What does that mean? The famous hyphen — they asked Yosef Burg what is primary in Religious Zionism, the Zionism or the religiosity? Of course that’s a provocative Haredi question. So Burg answered: what is primary is not the Zionism and not the religiosity, but the hyphen — the hyphen that connects them. And in a certain sense I think that’s not just a clever line; it’s a very deep understanding of this movement called Religious Zionism. Because Religious Zionism does not mean being Zionist and being religious, but that your Zionism is religious. You join the Zionist movement, but not for the reason the secular Zionist is there; rather for religious reasons, as I said before — the commandment to settle the Land, and so on, commandments dependent on the Land and the like. So therefore the essence of Religious Zionism is the hyphen. Now, I argued that I am religious and Zionist without a hyphen. What does that mean? I’m a religious Jew, but my Zionism is secular Zionism. It is secular Zionism not in the sense that the commandments dependent on the Land are not important to me, or that the commandment of settling the Land or conquering the Land is not important to me, but in the sense that my Zionism does not depend on them. This is a good opportunity to fulfill commandments dependent on the Land, and perhaps to fulfill the commandment of settling the Land if there is such a commandment, but that is not why I am a Zionist. I am a Zionist because of the Springtime of Nations, exactly like Ben-Gurion. And therefore my Zionism is secular; it is not based on religion. What does that actually mean? It means that I am adopting here a modern value, the value of nationality, the Springtime of Nations, alongside my religious values. Of course it integrates, it enters my life, and I make decisions according to those values too. But this is the adoption of modern values. It is not drawn from the Torah. In the Torah there is no value of being independent and being a free people in our land. You can play with the texts and squeeze that out in little sermonettes. In the simple sense, there is no such value. One should live in the Land of Israel, one should fulfill commandments dependent on the Land, maybe conquer it — all good. That’s it. People did not speak the modern language of sovereignty, of statehood — that was not the language spoken until, I don’t know, 150 years ago, maybe a bit more. So that is not the discourse. National values, the values of sovereignty, of independence, of statehood, of national identity — those are modern values. Therefore grounding Zionism on those values actually reflects not Religious Zionism but specifically Modern Orthodoxy. Because that basically means that I adopt a modern value and bring it into my value system and also into my religious conduct. But not because it derives from religious sources — independently of that. You can also ground it in religious sources, and I’m somewhat doubtful about that matter because I don’t think this state is a Jewish state in the sense that it fulfills the commandments of conquering the Land and settling the Land, but that’s really a separate issue that has to be discussed on its own. But even if so, even if it can be grounded in religious values, I don’t need them for this. Even if they’re correct. Even without that, I’m a Zionist. Like Ben-Gurion, like Leibowitz said — yes, in a survey of intellectuals, they did a survey among journalists, they did a survey among intellectuals in the 1950s, they asked everyone: why are you a Zionist? A short answer from each one: why are you a Zionist? So Leibowitz said, “Because we’re fed up of the goyim.” Someone corrected me afterward — “fed up” from the rule of the goyim, yes? But that’s how I remembered it, I don’t know, I didn’t go check it again — “we’re fed up of the goyim.” What does that mean? I’m here and I’m a Zionist not because there is a commandment to settle the Land, not because it’s terribly religious and allows me to fulfill commandments, but because I’m sick of the goyim. I want a state of Jews, independent, sovereign, self-determination. That’s all — pure Springtime of Nations.
[Speaker D] So from your point of view, the state is not the beginning of redemption.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I have no idea. From my point of view, my Zionism does not depend on whether it is the beginning of redemption. Maybe it is and maybe it isn’t. I don’t think anyone knows, and I certainly don’t know.
[Speaker D] So all these prayers that are focused on the state, the army, Hallel?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Usually it gives me the chills. What? It gives me the chills. Once there was a wedding canopy for a student of mine from Yeruham, and it was very amusing. It was a wedding canopy for a student of mine from Yeruham, and they called me under the canopy to recite the Prayer for the Welfare of the State. The guys there were dying laughing, my students. Dying laughing, because they knew that prayer makes my temperature rise. They called me innocently; I don’t think he did it on purpose, I really don’t think he did it on purpose. Innocently. So I went and said it, because I didn’t want to make provocations there, but it really doesn’t speak to me. That prayer is completely foreign to me. As far as I’m concerned, it’s like a prayer for the welfare of the emperor, His Exalted Majesty the Emperor. Not that my identification with the state is like with an emperor—I identify with it very much—I just don’t see it as part of my religious dimension. Meaning, I don’t connect it to my religious world. Those connections make me break out in a fever; in my view that leads to a very problematic fascism. And flags in the synagogue make me break out in a fever. Flags in general do that to me, but in a synagogue it’s another two degrees.
[Speaker D] So I’ll go even a bit further—you also wouldn’t offer a prayer when we go out to war.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, that’s something else. I wouldn’t offer a prayer when going out to war because I don’t think the Holy One, blessed be He, helps or is involved in the world. But that has nothing to do with the Zionist question; it’s not connected to the Zionist question. If I thought the Holy One, blessed be He, helps, then I would offer a prayer that He help me, just as I ask Him to heal me. It has nothing to do with the religious value of the state. I want to stay alive, I want to live here, I want to preserve my independence, and not be killed, and not be thrown into the sea. And if I can ask the Holy One, blessed be He, to help me with that, then of course I would ask—why not? It has nothing to do with Zionism. Same thing with army service: army service is a civic duty, not a religious commandment. It’s a civic duty that every citizen who has loyalty to his state must fulfill—his rights and his obligations—not because there is a commandment of conquering the land and helping the people of Israel against an oppressor. That may also be true, again I’m saying, but that is not the fundamental basis for why I think there is an obligation to serve. Okay, so all the…
[Speaker E] Can I ask a small question? This approach of the Rabbi to Zionism, which very much reminds me of Leibowitz’s and which I also very, very much support—for some reason, both Leibowitz and the Rabbi, as I read things, were very open to modern value-based interpretation. So how is that actually connected to this attitude toward Zionism as something that is not religious, but rather so that we can live in freedom?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I just explained: precisely because it does not come on a religious basis, it connects to Modern Orthodoxy, because that basically means that the values on which I rely here are modern, external values. It’s not interpretation of Torah or extracting meta-values from it. It’s recognition of the validity of external values and bringing them into my religious world, in the sense that this of course radiates outward; it has religious implications. I think that in that sense you must cooperate with the state, you must serve in the army, but not because the state is the beginning of redemption and not because there is some commandment that we fulfill through it, but because there is an obligation to be loyal and to fulfill your duties in return for the rights that you receive. And of course every moral value is also the will of God. Not to mention that…
[Speaker E] But the rejection, the rejection of the religious content of religion that the Rabbi mentioned a few minutes ago—that there’s a great danger of fascism in it, and maybe we see that today as well—isn’t that a very value-laden claim that actually indicates granting deep value to all our service of God?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I agree. That reinforces even more the Modern Orthodox characteristic of this view. If you derive it from modern national values, then you’re Modern Orthodox. If you even recoil from basing it on religious values, then you’re even more Modern Orthodox. Okay? Meaning, that’s the… I completely agree. So basically the claim—notice what’s happening here—is that there are two Religious Zionist conceptions: one with a hyphen and one without a hyphen. The first is plain, simplistic conservatism, not even interpretive conservatism, and the second is Modern Orthodoxy. I think this analysis sharpens in the best possible way the disconnect—almost the contrast, not contrast but lack of dependence—between Religious Zionism and Modern Orthodoxy. They’re simply two independent things. There’s no connection between them; on the contrary, one of them basically says that you’re not really in the other. They can coexist in the same person, but one of them, in a certain sense, makes the other unnecessary. Okay? So that’s why I think this analysis defines very well—or sharpens very well—the difference between these two shades of non-Haredi Judaism: Modern Orthodox and Religious Zionist.
[Speaker D] Would it be correct to say that from your perspective there’s really no place for a political party whose banner is religion?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, no. I think that’s true, but not for that reason. I think it’s simply harmful, so I oppose it. But in terms of the conception itself, not necessarily, because you can establish a party that wants to bring it about that citizens, and maybe even the state itself, observe as many commandments as possible. That has nothing to do with the question whether conquering the land and establishing a state is a religious value. Obviously there is an interest in Jews observing commandments; nobody disputes that. So if someone thinks religious parties advance that, I don’t, but if someone thinks they do, he can support that even if he’s Modern Orthodox like me. Meaning, I don’t support it, but not for the Modern Orthodox reason; it’s simply for a practical reason—I don’t think it helps, on the contrary, it usually harms. So in this context there’s something that always comes to mind: in Bnei Brak there’s a famous joke about the Rabbi of Ponevezh. The Rabbi of Ponevezh used to hang a flag every Independence Day on the roof of the yeshiva. Now today’s apologists of course explain that he feared the Zionists because they were suspected of bloodshed, so he was afraid that if he didn’t hang a flag there they would shoot him and the yeshiva students. Well, there is no limit to the level of creativity in the interpretations they give to things that don’t suit them. In any case, he hung a flag there. I once heard from the journalist Dov Gnihovsky—we were together one Sabbath—he told me that he sat with the Rabbi of Ponevezh on the roof and together they guarded the flag all day. They learned together, talked; they guarded the flag together. He, as an old-time Bnei Brak man—his brother, after all, was head of Yeshivat Chachmei Bavel—no, actually he was a member of Knesset. No, yes, Dov Gnihovsky was, yes, head of Yeshivat Chachmei Bavel, yes. In any case, the students kept trying to steal the flag; they played this flag game every Independence Day, because the students were real hardline religious guys, not like the lightweight that their yeshiva head was, secretly a Zionist lightweight. Now the Rabbi of Ponevezh, besides the flag… did not recite Hallel on Independence Day. Certainly he didn’t instruct the yeshiva to recite Hallel. But on the other hand they also didn’t recite Tachanun—like on a Jewish holiday, when you don’t say Tachanun. So once they asked him: whichever way you look at it, if you’re a Zionist, then say Hallel. If you’re not a Zionist, then say Tachanun. It’s even a Nakba, a day of mourning. For the Haredim, Independence Day is the Nakba. So you should say—you should say Tachanun. Two Tachanuns, even, not like on an ordinary weekday, which is just a regular weekday. Here it’s a day of mourning. So he said to them: I am no more and no less Zionist than Ben-Gurion. I’m as Zionist as Ben-Gurion. He too doesn’t say Hallel and doesn’t say Tachanun on Independence Day, and I too don’t say Hallel and don’t say Tachanun on Independence Day. Now, in Bnei Brak they look at this as some sharp little quip at the expense of the Zionists, and they don’t understand that it’s just shooting themselves in the foot. It’s not a joke in any sense. In my opinion that is an entirely serious answer. And what the Rabbi of Ponevezh said here was that he was a secular Zionist like Ben-Gurion. He did not see it as a religious holiday, but he definitely celebrated it as a national holiday. He was happy that a state had been established, certainly as a Holocaust refugee. Everyone knows, everyone is familiar with the inscription there. And how does it go? “And on Mount Zion there shall be those who escape, and it shall be holy.” I don’t remember exactly how the verse goes from Isaiah. There’s a verse written there in big letters on the old Ponevezh building: “And on Mount Zion there shall be those who escape, and it shall be holy.” He was a secular Zionist, that’s clear. He hung the flag not out of fear that the Zionists would kill him, but because he felt identification in the national-civic sense with the state, and gratitude to the state, and joy that it exists and that we are not at the mercy of non-Jews, and so on. All that was completely there for him, I’m sure of it. But he did not see this as a religious holiday. He was a secular Zionist. Can I ask a question? Wait, one second. He didn’t say Hallel because it wasn’t a religious holiday, and he didn’t say Tachanun because all in all he was happy on that day; it’s a very joyous day. No worse than Purim Frankfurt, or I don’t know, Casablanca, where a community establishes a holiday for itself because of some miracle of deliverance that happened to them, and for generations they don’t say Tachanun on that day, and of course maybe even say Hallel. Meaning, certainly what we merited here is no worse than Purim Casablanca. So he didn’t say Tachanun, but he also didn’t say Hallel. And in that sense he was Zionist like Ben-Gurion. Of course, the similarity between why Ben-Gurion didn’t say those two things and why he didn’t say those two things is not the same thing. So it’s a sharp formulation, but the answer he gave to the question is entirely serious. This either-or—that either you say Hallel and don’t say Tachanun, or you don’t say Hallel and do say Tachanun—is incorrect. I don’t say Hallel and I don’t say Tachanun. Because I’m a secular Zionist. I’m a religious Jew and a secular Zionist. That’s basically what he said. By the way, there’s also no obstacle to saying Hallel as a secular Zionist. I do say Hallel. Because all in all, if your life was saved, what does that have to do with the question whether the state is the state of “the first flowering of our redemption” or the beginning of redemption, or whether the state is just—simply—the fulfillment of what we longed for over many years, that a state for our people was established here, and we’re tremendously happy about it and thank the Holy One, blessed be He, and praise the Holy One, blessed be He, for that. What’s the problem? Why does that have anything to do with the religious value of the state? But the Rabbi of Ponevezh apparently understood that in order to express the fact that this is a civic holiday or a secular holiday, he did not say Hallel and he also did not say Tachanun. By the way, I don’t know what they do abroad. Eliav, what do they do in France on Bastille Day or on French civic holidays? Do they say Tachanun?
[Speaker F] They say it, yes. On French holidays, yes, of course. They say it. Okay, interesting.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Also not Hallel. Hallel they definitely don’t say, that’s obvious.
[Speaker F] I was only asking whether
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] they say or don’t say Tachanun. All in all, it’s a happy day—why say Tachanun? A happy day.
[Speaker F] What does that have to do with chopping off heads during the taking of the Bastille?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I would act like the Rabbi of Ponevezh: I wouldn’t say Hallel and I wouldn’t say Tachanun.
[Speaker F] They chopped off heads, chopped off heads on Bastille Day.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s just because you’re not happy, never mind. So American Independence Day—doesn’t matter, I’m talking now at the principled level. You can fail to identify with it regardless of your being Jewish. You don’t identify with it because it’s a problematic day—Robespierre and his gang there after the Bastille; obviously there were all kinds of dubious things there. But okay, let’s talk about a day that is purely joyful, the independence day of some state. Then I would act exactly… So in that sense I think this is precisely the outlook expressed by the Rabbi of Ponevezh when he said what he said. Therefore I think that in this sense this outlook, as I’ve said several times and also written, this outlook of Religious Zionism without a hyphen, or Modern Orthodoxy—Zionist, but a secular Zionist—is an outlook that in my opinion many people share, both in Religious Zionism and in Haredi society. In my opinion most Haredim are like this, an overwhelming majority of Haredim are like this, and there are also quite a few in Religious Zionism.
[Speaker B] Regarding the verse written at Ponevezh, “And on Mount Zion there shall be those who escape, and it shall be holy”—the emphasis of that verse is “and it shall be holy.” Doesn’t that mean anything? Doesn’t it perhaps express some religious value? I
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] don’t think so. He says the verse because that’s the verse.
[Speaker B] But why did he choose that verse?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Because of the Holocaust—there was a remnant that found refuge in the Land of Israel, so that’s why the verse was written there. It ends with
[Speaker B] “the house of Jacob,”
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] but it ends with “and it shall be holy.” Fine, okay.
[Speaker B] It
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] He did not mean that the State of Israel is holy. So my claim is basically that because of the confusion that exists here in Israel, in Israeli religious society, between Religious Zionism and Modern Orthodoxy—all the non-Haredim are basically under the heading of Religious Zionism—this identity, the Modern Orthodox identity, does not exist on the map. And of course there are quite a few activists, leaders, rabbis, and so on, who have an interest in perpetuating this confusion, because otherwise it pulls the rug out from under the base of their power. And therefore they preserve the argument, or the political-religious dividing line, as if it were a dispute between Religious Zionism and Haredi society—a dispute that died decades ago. It has no practical implications; there is no connection whatsoever today between Haredi society and anti-Zionism, except in words. They conduct themselves toward the state exactly as Religious Zionism conducts itself toward the state; there is no difference between them. Therefore the real dividing line that ought to exist is the dividing line around modernity, not around Zionism. Are you a Modern Orthodox person or a non-modern Orthodox person, and not whether you are a Religious Zionist or a religious non-Zionist. And that is precisely the second characteristic. Except what? The power base of all the Religious Zionist and Haredi leadership was built around the Zionist issue. And the people who control that leadership are all Haredi. All the rabbinic leadership of Religious Zionism is completely Haredi. Haredi in every sense, except for a blessing and a few chapters of Hallel on Independence Day. A blessing maybe—some yes, some no. That’s it. Other than that, their attitude toward Jewish law, everything I’ve described up to now, is all completely non-modern Orthodoxy, like Haredim, exactly like the Haredim, there is no difference. So that’s why it’s not convenient for them for the Religious Zionist public to split into Modern Orthodoxy and Religious Zionism, because then if this identity were really put on the table and people seriously chose between the two identities, in my opinion they’d be left balancing on the head of a pin—there’d be nobody left there. All the great rabbis of Religious Zionism, who for some reason always appoint themselves as spokesmen for the public, are people nobody cares what they say—except for some very small group. People of Merkaz, I don’t know, Har Hamor, and a few such circles who care what those rabbis say. And they constantly serve as representatives of the Religious Zionist public; they speak in its name, they chart its way, they determine its ethos, and somehow create in people the feeling that even if I don’t identify with those figures, the problem is with me because I’m a lightweight, but really my ideal model, my utopia, is them. That’s the feeling they create, and most of the public buys it. When the truth is that if the Modern Orthodox identity were clearly put on the table and people were told: this is no less faithful to Jewish law; it is simply another conception, a different conception, which is also not Reform, by the way, but it’s also not simplistic conservatism, it’s not “lite-ism,” like all the labels they attach to this conception in order to suppress it, in order not to allow it to gain legitimacy—then I think we would discover that the majority would suddenly realize that the slogans it itself espouses are not really the slogans it believes in. You cling to anachronistic slogans of being for Zionism and against Zionism. The state has existed for seventy-five years already. What—what—what does “for” mean? Are we arguing now about whether to establish a state? What—what is the argument about? Who cares? What is this about? Right, the example I gave is the elections for the Chief Rabbinate. Yes, in the elections for the Chief Rabbinate, the last elections, there were a few Religious Zionist candidates and a few Haredi candidates. And there were always all kinds of intrigues because there was Rabbi Stav, and there were rabbis—Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu, and there was also that redheaded dayan, I forgot his name, not Rabbi Schriera, but what’s his name, I don’t remember, his name slipped my mind. And in the end, because of the split in the Religious Zionist group, the Haredi rabbis were elected: Rabbi Lau, David Lau, and Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef. Okay? And then intense lamentation began in the Religious Zionist press: how foolish we were not to unite, and with our own hands we handed the Chief Rabbinate over to the Haredim. And I died laughing when I read that. Basic conceptual analysis would show that this is nonsense. The confrontation in the Chief Rabbinate elections was not at all between Zionists and non-Zionists. What difference does it make whether the rabbi is Zionist or non-Zionist? Whether he says Hallel? Who cares? The question is what he does. The question is how he determines the status of women in the religious courts, what he does with the sale permit, how he relates to agunot, all kinds of things of that sort. Conversions, all kinds of things of that sort. What does that have to do with Zionism? It has to do with whether you are liberal, open, or whether you are conservative—interpretively conservative, simplistically conservative, Modern Orthodox. Let’s say interpretively conservative versus Modern Orthodox, there’s no simplistic conservative. Okay? Now if that is really the dividing line, then in the elections for the Chief Rabbinate there was one rabbi from the relatively Modern Orthodox side—that was Rabbi Stav—and all the other rabbis were Haredi. Every last one of them. So what’s surprising about the fact that Haredi rabbis were chosen? Everyone looks at it through the lenses of a struggle between Religious Zionism and Haredi society, and says how can it be that we as Religious Zionism were not smart enough to unite so that our representative would be elected. For one very simple reason: there was nothing around which to unite. The dispute was not about Zionism; the dispute was about conservatism. And in terms of conservatism there was an overwhelming majority in favor of the conservative side, so no wonder it won. That’s all. Nothing here was surprising, nothing here was disappointing, everything was foreseeable in advance. Now it’s so clear, so obvious, that I tear my hair out when I see these stupid analyses of how Religious Zionism failed and why they didn’t cooperate. They didn’t cooperate because they simply don’t agree with one another at all. What is the difference between the two rabbis who were elected and all the Religious Zionist rabbis who were candidates? You won’t see a difference with a microscope. You won’t find a difference, even with a microscope. But there are significant differences between all of them and Rabbi Stav. So what’s surprising if they form a coalition and elect Haredi rabbis? What—what does it matter? Zionism—by the way, I think Rabbi David Lau says Hallel on Independence Day; I wouldn’t be surprised if he said Hallel even before he was elected Chief Rabbi. And someone told me Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef does not say it, although when you see what he writes he supports saying Hallel without a blessing, and his father of course too, Rabbi Ovadia—he has responsa on this. So they even say Hallel on Independence Day, or at least fully support the idea of saying Hallel. So what is non-Zionist about them? That they wear a black coat? The problem with them is not their non-Zionism; the problem with them is their conservatism. It is their Haredi conception of Jewish law—not of their attitude to the state, but of modernity. That’s the point. But on that issue there really was an overwhelming majority on that side, and therefore it won. That’s all. Nothing here is surprising; everything is self-evident. This is a wonderful example of the self-misunderstanding that prevails in the Religious Zionist public, this failure to understand itself, because people don’t do the analysis I’m talking about here and don’t understand the difference and the relationships between the ideas. They connect Religious Zionism with Modern Orthodoxy as if it were the same thing, make it into some kind of jumble, one big salad, and then the dispute is between Zionists and Haredim, and we don’t understand the results: wait, but there’s a Zionist majority, so how can it be that the Haredim won? There is a Zionist majority, but the elections were not about Zionism; they were about modernity. And in modernity there is only a tiny brilliant minority that is modern. So that’s why they don’t win. That’s all, very simple. Regrettable from my perspective, but very simple. Nothing here is surprising. The whole discourse is bizarre. Now some of it is inadvertent, but in my opinion some of it is also deliberate. Because for the Haredi leadership of Religious Zionism—and all the leadership of Religious Zionism is entirely Haredi. Meaning, the leadership is entirely Haredi, both that of the Haredim and that of the Religious Zionists—it is very important to keep the matter vague. It is very important for them to define everyone who is not like them as “lite,” neo-Reform, or all kinds of labels of that sort. Some really are like that, I’m not saying the label is entirely baseless. I’m just saying that it is not true that they are all like that or that there is no other idea. But it is important for them to remove this idea from the table. It has to be either Haredi or lite. That’s it. Religious Zionist? Fine, say Hallel on Independence Day, who cares. Either Haredi or lite. That’s it, those are the two options. What about Modern Orthodox? It doesn’t exist on the map. It doesn’t exist on the map, despite the fact that in my opinion, in my estimation, most of the public is there, the religious public. Most of the religious public is there, but as long as there is not such a defined identity on the table—the ideological table, yes?—as long as it isn’t defined, clarified that this too is faithfulness to Jewish law and that it is not lite-ism, it is not the same thing as sloppiness or lite-ism, and that it is a legitimate identity one can follow, and perhaps that there would also be rabbinic leadership for that identity, then suddenly it would become clear that the two sides who are constantly fighting each other, the Haredim and the Religious Zionists, would be left without troops. Nobody would be there except a few crazies. And therefore it is no wonder that both sides fight against the emergence of this third identity. They don’t even allow it to open its mouth. They slander it and don’t allow it, they label it, because it threatens them in a very deep way. Not necessarily all consciously; I’m not claiming there are protocols of the Elders of Zion here. But subconsciously it is clear that there is a very great threat here to the Haredi worldview. The threat will not come from Religious Zionism, from Merkaz and Har Hamor. The threat will come from the bloc. And therefore the bloc has no religious identity. There is no such identity, an identity of Gush, Alon Shvut, Gush, yes—the places closer to Modern Orthodoxy. They have not managed to develop an independent identity of their own. They remain sheltered under Religious Zionism, speaking the Religious Zionist discourse, and in doing so they shoot themselves and all of us in the foot, in my opinion. A shame. So that’s the political analysis.
[Speaker D] In practice, if you…
[Speaker E] The analysis is simply wonderful, simply wonderful. Do you hear?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Wait.
[Speaker D] The analysis is simply wonderful. Okay, thank you. Ezra. According to your definition, that you’re a secular Zionist and a religious Jew, then the body called the Rabbinate should belong to your religious side and not at all to the Zionist side
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] and not at all to the institution of the state.
[Speaker D] It should have been abolished and evaporated from the world yesterday.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It should belong neither to the secular side nor to the religious side. The religious side doesn’t care about it one bit; nobody cares what the Rabbinate says.
[Speaker D] So then how would you act on your religious plane in order to know who decides Jewish law and who says what to do?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] “Make for yourself a rabbi” existed throughout the generations even before there was a state; there was never a Chief Rabbinate. What—everyone has his own rabbi, a community rabbi or whatever, a halakhic decisor. Today in our world you don’t need a community rabbi. You have emails, telephones, faxes, I don’t know what, WhatsApps. You can ask whomever you want around the world and get an answer in a second. What’s the problem? Why do you need a Chief Rabbinate? Especially since nobody asks the Chief Rabbinate anyway. It’s a bunch of nobodies. Their status comes by force of secular law, as Leibowitz said all the time; all of their status is secular, they have no status in the religious sense, and therefore the religious public really doesn’t relate to them. What is this? These are third-rate people. The leadership of the Chief Rabbinate, on the Torah level, are at most third-tier people. Everybody knows that, it’s not… Secular people don’t understand anything, so okay, those are their rabbis, I don’t know. The absurdity here is that the secular people crown these fools over us, these fools of prophecy. Once I was on one of those panels that students organized here in Lod on the night of Shavuot. Those guys, on the night vigil they don’t learn, they do panels. So there was a panel about the Chief Rabbinate and they invited me in the role of the rabbi. They didn’t understand that I would be the left wing in that discussion. I told them that those to blame for the Rabbinate being conservative, coercive, fossilized—that’s them, the secular majority in this state. Do what needs to be done. I’ll be completely with you. The people who prevent the appointment of rabbis here who would be more open, more liberal—if you need a Chief Rabbinate at all—are the secular people. And by the way, in my opinion—if we’re already into politics and pseudo-psychology—in my opinion it’s not, if we’re already in political and pseudo-psychological matters, it’s not only because of coalition considerations as everyone thinks, because you need the Haredim for the coalition and there’s a tie and all kinds of things. In my opinion that’s not it. Not only that. There’s something in the average Jew, secular and also religious, for whom the ethos is that a rabbi is Haredi. A Religious Zionist is not a rabbi, he’s a toy. Here, Rabbi Stav with that knitted kippah and sandals, he was with me in the paratroopers, he was an instructor in Bnei Akiva. Come on, that’s not a rabbi, that’s a toy. A rabbi has to be some sort of… with a beard, a big beard, a black coat. It doesn’t matter whether he knows something or doesn’t know something, but he’s the rabbi. All the Haredi members of Knesset are “Rabbi this” and “Rabbi that.” They’re all rabbis. Why? Because they wear black and do whatever they feel like. Meaning, the ethos in the broad public, the Jewish religious ethos, is a Haredi ethos even among secular people. When they see a Haredi rabbi, they’ll give him respect as a rabbi. When they see a Religious Zionist rabbi, they won’t give him that respect. He’s some knitted-kippah guy who doesn’t look like some rabbinic figure. Therefore I think that beyond the political conjunctures there is something in secular people that does not let them replace these hardline conservative rabbis with something more… more, I don’t know what to call it, friendly, liberal, open. That’s not Judaism. True, I don’t like Judaism and I get angry that they force it on me, all that is true. But if there has to be a rabbi, then that’s a rabbi. That one isn’t a rabbi; that one’s a Bnei Akiva counselor. And I myself, as someone who moved between these worlds, can give you a personal confession: it was very, very hard for me to free myself from that. It took me a lot of work. When I came from Bnei Brak it was obvious to me that a rabbi wearing a knitted kippah could sit in my class in the third row. That’s it. You were never going to convince me that there was someone really worth hearing, someone you could learn from, even though he wore a knitted kippah and maybe even sandals, heaven forbid. And it took me a very long time to remove from within myself these deeply ingrained notions and to convince myself that they were wrong.
[Speaker D] But one should also note that you hardly hear, in Religious Zionist Judaism, the term “great Torah authority.” In Haredi Judaism, by contrast, everything revolves around “great Torah authorities.” Doesn’t that teach us something?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The status of the great Torah authorities in the Haredi world is of course much more central than in the Religious Zionist public, that’s clear. But the fact is that whenever political decisions are made, the forum that gathers to stir that decision up is a forum of rabbis in Religious Zionism too. Have you ever heard of a forum of Religious Zionist intellectuals that politicians come to consult? No. It’s always Rabbi Lior, Rabbi Melamed, Rabbi Yaakov Ariel, and Rabbi Druckman. That’s it. Now who cares what they say? A collection of Haredim who say Hallel. That’s all. The fact that they positioned themselves as the leadership of the Religious Zionist public is because in the Religious Zionist idea they really are its leadership. Because the Religious Zionist idea is Haredi. It’s Haredi that fulfills the commandment of settling the Land. Fine. But in its whole attitude toward Jewish law it’s a Haredi attitude. A Modern Orthodox person wouldn’t look in the direction of those guys. And most of the public is there, but how are you going to explain to most of the public that it doesn’t really belong to their group? We grew up on this from our mother’s milk. It is so hard to break free of it. Look at the case—if I’m already in politics—look at the case of Idit Silman and the ridiculous people like her. Her whole discourse is ridiculous. She quite obviously belongs to another group, of Modern Orthodoxy, but she cannot stand up to the pressures of those who educated her and raised her and explained to her that she is Religious Zionist and therefore must basically behave as instructed by the Haredi rabbis who are called Religious Zionist. And in the end that won out because she couldn’t withstand it, because she doesn’t have the capacities, the… Torah backbone, let’s call it, the intellectual backbone that can stand against those pressures. Because they constantly explain to you that you are not okay and that you are not upholding the education we gave you. And that’s true—she is not upholding the education they gave her, and good for her. But how do you explain that all the rabbis you admired in childhood, who are considered the great sages of the generation and luminaries of the nation and great Torah authorities—some of them really are great Torah authorities, some are not—but try explaining that okay, all of them disappointed me, they’re demagogues, and I don’t believe in their Judaism. It’s very hard for someone who grew up in Religious Zionist education to express such a position, and therefore pressure was applied to her and to those like her. No wonder it bears fruit. All of Bennett’s problems, by the way—I wrote on the website—that Bennett’s success, in my opinion, is because he managed to touch that sentiment. People suddenly saw someone who represented not Religious Zionism but Modern Orthodoxy. Doesn’t matter, it may be that he’s also lite; he’s apparently no great luminary from the Torah standpoint, that’s my impression, I don’t know him. It doesn’t matter. But many perceived him as someone who politically represents that direction. Now when you gather such people who identify with that direction, suddenly—listen, he succeeded. Meaning, the National Religious Party before him floundered somewhere in shallow waters; when he came, suddenly they took off. Because there is a public that suddenly understood there is something that represents it. Now what happened? The moment they saw this, all the conservative Haredi forces that lead Religious Zionism started fighting it. Because they understand that behind it stands a movement that threatens their very existence. It’s not this or that lie that Bennett told, or whether he behaved this way or that way—you can argue about that, doesn’t matter, it doesn’t interest me right now. It doesn’t come from there at all. Why would they care about the lies? If those lies led in positive directions, they would all support them and say amen. But they saw here someone who might create the identity they have been trying to suppress for many years. And it becomes an all-out war without limits. With demagoguery, with lies, with insane rhetoric. And under that insane pressure, people who are not equipped with intellectual and Torah tools, who cannot stand up to these pressures and say, friends, I’m not with you. Health and happiness to you—you’re Religious Zionists, I’m Modern Orthodox. I don’t recognize you, you are not my leaders, you do not chart my path, you do not interest me in that sense. Good people, respectable people, I respect you, everything is fine, but I am not on your path. Leave me alone, for God’s sake. For a person to say such a thing he needs some kind of backbone. You can’t be some Bennett who doesn’t know one Hebrew letter from another and stand up to all this—it’s very hard. Because you don’t have the theory backing you, the identity, the principles, the worldview that backs such a path as a legitimate religious path. And then what happens? The more ignorant you are—whether you’re lite or not lite doesn’t matter—the more you understand that you cannot deviate from the dictates of the Haredi leadership of Religious Zionism—I meant the Haredim of Religious Zionism. You can’t deviate from it because they are the great sages of the generation. True, I’m not there, I’m lite anyway, they don’t interest me. But that’s Religious Zionism; if I come to represent Religious Zionism, I can’t ignore what they say. And precisely because he is ignorant, he failed here. Because if he were a Torah scholar, then he could say, friends, you do not represent me, I belong to a different religious conception. I’m not impressed by your preaching, your wars, your pressures. I represent another public, and I’m creating for it a different identity.
[Speaker G] You touched on the point I wanted to raise and intended not to raise, but now it’s the central point in my opinion.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The
[Speaker G] central point is that in the end, look at the number of scholars, or the percentage of scholars, in the Haredi public, or the religious-Haredi public as you define it—and I agree with every word you said—versus the number of scholars in the Modern Orthodox public. I know one such person.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There’s no comparison.
[Speaker G] I know one such person, I know only one,
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] one
[Speaker G] only, who is a scholar, a scholar on a very high level.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Don’t let the preaching confuse you, Shmuel, there are more, there are more, many more.
[Speaker G] No, it may be, I know only one and I know quite a few in the Haredi world.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And that’s part of the same problem.
[Speaker G] Which is—how do you do it? How do you make it so that there will be more and more? In my opinion that’s a key point. Nothing else will help. Nothing will happen unless there is a very large number of scholars, a quantity of scholars, in the Modern Orthodox public.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t know how to do it. No help for it. Obviously it’s much harder than producing a scholar in Haredi society, because that’s a society that has many fronts on which it fights. You know, when there’s a machine that is both a washing machine and a dryer, it does the washing less well and the drying less well. You’re trying to produce—as it says there in the Talmud, one craftsman at one task, like Shimon the Righteous. Meaning, once you are involved on many fronts, you will be less sharp on each one of them.
[Speaker G] That, that explains why, why it’s hard. But I’m saying that nothing will happen—the real Modern Orthodox public you’re talking about here will remain small if there aren’t a number of clear-cut Torah scholars in that public. Nothing will help.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I completely agree. And I think this thing is nevertheless beginning to form a bit, but you know, it takes time, and it takes—one has to consolidate such an identity, because even Torah scholars don’t always understand that they themselves are there. And they too are not aware that there is such a legitimate religious identity.
[Speaker G] That’s true, that’s true.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So I’m saying: this identity needs to be created, the concepts need to be defined. Part of what I’m trying to do in this talk and on my website is really to define this identity as a theory, so that people can find themselves and decide whether they are there or not there. As long as it’s not on the table as an option, people aren’t even standing at the crossroads of deciding. I’ll give you a parable.
[Speaker G] When I want to learn in depth, I go to—you know to whom I go. During COVID not so much. And I heard from you of two people I went to, one also on Saturday night in Jerusalem, and I heard from you that you also took your students from Yeruham to him.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Correct. I’d take them even today.
[Speaker G] Yes, but you didn’t find—but you won’t find one in the Modern Orthodox world that you would take them to in order to learn in depth.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Not sure, I’m not sure. But, but what difference does it make? The Modern Orthodox that I know—I want to encounter things I know less well.
[Speaker G] Fine, I’m saying that in my opinion that’s a necessary condition to untie this knot.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I agree, and I don’t know what to say or what to do beyond what I’m trying to do both here and there.
[Speaker D] No, but maybe, maybe one of the ways, Shmuel, is to establish Modern Orthodox yeshivot but with the thesis that says “you shall meditate on it day and night” like the Haredim.
[Speaker G] I agree with you one hundred percent, of course.
[Speaker E] Rabbi, Rabbi, may I disagree with the last two speakers? I think that anyone who is even slightly—at least the way I feel—that much-praised Haredi scholarship is in decline, the graph is in free fall. You see the level of the scholarly yeshivot, including Hebron and others, in decline. Precisely because that is not the way of Torah. And precisely because this search for scholarship day and night without any social involvement and without any value-based engagement and relevance to the present—I don’t know, maybe I’m not familiar enough, maybe not, that’s
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] enough, maybe not, that’s
[Speaker E] my feeling, that’s my feeling. But maybe one can suggest something else, one can suggest something else. The Rabbi said such important things today, and really such rare things, because very few rabbis speak with such courage and with such knowledge and power of expression. If the Rabbi would consider putting these things out in some kind of book—after all, a book is not a website—and even a short book, something that creates a discourse and might perhaps really change the discourse. The lack is truly essential.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I said I don’t know, people don’t read books anymore, that’s one of the problems. There’s a website, there are posts, there’s all that; I think through that it works more effectively. But I don’t know, maybe. We need to think about it.
[Speaker G] The Rabbi isn’t lacking books; there are about thirty of them.
[Speaker E] No, I meant a focused book on the current series.
[Speaker G] The current one.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] On this subject there’s the trilogy; in the trilogy I think I did deal with it. Right, right.
[Speaker E] Yes, but when there’s a short book, even a little booklet like that, and then there are discussions about it, and now people are writing about it in the newspaper and debating it, and it sparks conversation and dispute, and maybe finally some real polemic, where all the rabbis—except for the Rabbi—for some reason don’t have the courage to say these things. Even those who do, the few of them, fall silent; they don’t want to sharpen the points.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] We’ll think about it. It’s an idea worth thinking about.
[Speaker H] To which group does the Rabbi affiliate what are called the Beit Hillel rabbis, or “Attentive Torah Leadership”? That’s what they call themselves.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The Beit Hillel rabbis—I assume a large part of them also belong here. But they too, in my opinion, haven’t defined well enough the theory within which they operate, their identity. And when you see responsa written there, they’re always all second-order. Meaning, it’s always: there’s this precedent and that precedent. We’ll see this in the next lesson—I can see we won’t manage to get to it now—in the next lesson I’ll really touch on this point. And in that sense I think they miss the mark very, very badly. The piece I wrote about first-order and second-order I wrote in response to a responsum the Beit Hillel rabbis wrote about an orphan girl saying Kaddish, which I made fun of. And besides that, they suggested that I join when they set the thing up. As a matter of principle I don’t join groups of rabbis, because I don’t like people speaking in my name. But there in Beit Hillel in particular I said I’m not willing to tolerate a situation where every man or woman is called rabbi, male or female, just because they’re willing to join Beit Hillel. With all due respect, if you know how to learn some midrash, that doesn’t make you a female rabbi. There’s some minimal threshold of knowledge or halakhic skill required before you can call someone a rabbi, male or female, and there for some reason they’re not very strict about that. So that’s the built-in weakness. Again, part of it is because there really is a shortage of such people, so it’s difficult—but on the other hand, this compromise carries a heavy price. If it’s hard to find such people, then stay with a few; don’t compromise. All right, so we really have drifted into politics.
[Speaker C] Can I ask a few things? Yes. At the beginning you said that in your view Zionism is a straightforward realization of the Torah’s values. So why don’t you advocate a Torah-based conception? And another thing you said—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I said two things. First of all, I do advocate it. I’m only saying that even without it I would be just as Zionist. Meaning, I don’t need the— But you—
[Speaker C] A secular Zionist.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’m saying again: even if there were no Torah basis for the Religious Zionist conception, I would be Zionist and religious. On top of that, besides that, it may be that I also fulfill the commandment of conquering the Land and all sorts of other things for religious reasons—but my Zionism doesn’t need religiosity in order to grant it legitimacy. My Zionism is secular alone. That’s the first point. And the second point is that I really also don’t accept this all the way through. The thought, the ideology—I certainly don’t accept it, neither the Zionist one nor the Haredi one. This is not “the beginning of redemption” and not “the footsteps of the messiah,” and all these concepts—after all, no one who uses them understands them, so they’re just slogans. Nobody knows what’s happening here, or what the processes are, or what will happen in the future, and all the attempts to identify this from the prophets are somewhere between magic and divination. And therefore I don’t connect at all to Religious Zionist thought. I was never there, not even behind the curtain. And regarding the halakhic dimension, I’m entirely in favor of observing the commandments dependent on the Land, but that has nothing to do with state sovereignty. And as for conquering the Land: first, I’m not at all sure there is such a commandment—Nachmanides says yes, but in Maimonides it’s quite clear that there isn’t. And second, I don’t think the State of Israel fulfills that commandment even if it exists, because it doesn’t act in the name of Jewish law. This is not a Jewish state in the sense in which I define a Jewish state.
[Speaker C] Because you commented on the Rabbi of Ponevezh, on his statement about Ben-Gurion—you said that from there you can see he was a secular Zionist. But the fact that he hung the flag on his yeshiva and not in the window of his home, something like that—doesn’t that mean that he did see some Torah value in the existence of the State of Israel?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t know. A person at home—well, institutions also hang flags, not homes. At home, each person does according to his taste, but in an institution he hung a flag because that’s the custom, to hang flags on institutions. Certainly institutions that the state supports.
[Speaker C] In your lesson you mentioned Rabbi David Stav as Modern Orthodox. After all, he grew up in that same beit midrash, that same beit midrash as Rabbi Melamed and Rabbi Ariel. They kind of—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What does “that same beit midrash” mean? They studied at Merkaz, so what? I studied at Netivot Olam in Bnei Brak, and in the Chazon Ish kollel, and at Ponevezh.
[Speaker C] But your Orthodox affiliation—you say about secular people that they think the Haredim are—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, my religious affiliation doesn’t exist. I’m not interested in where I belong. A person is a rabbi if he has the knowledge, the skill, the mode of thinking required of a rabbi. Why should I care what kind of kippah he has on his head? A Haredi rabbi is also a rabbi in my eyes, obviously. I just don’t think that’s the only ideal model that exists. I’m not claiming that only someone who thinks like me is a rabbi and everyone else isn’t a rabbi—not at all.
[Speaker C] But in order to be Orthodox and a secular Zionist, then you have to hold within Orthodoxy that there’s no Zionism inherent in it, that Zionism doesn’t follow from it?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Not really have to. True, my Orthodoxy is not the basis of my Zionism. So what follows from that? That Rabbi Yaakov Ariel isn’t a rabbi? What does that have to do with anything? Rabbi Yaakov Ariel is a rabbi, certainly. He’s not—I don’t agree with his path, he doesn’t chart my way, I don’t agree with his halakhic approach. So what happened? There are many such people. All right, so I really didn’t manage to get through anything today. I drifted toward directions that are almost current-events-related—or actually current-events-related, not almost. But I think that, in the end, these are almost the necessary implications, or the essence, of this whole series that I’m trying to do here. The series I’m trying to do here is precisely an attempt to create order within the intentional mess that everyone is deliberately pushing us into. Deliberately, so as not to allow this additional identity to emerge and be present in the discourse. And therefore I think it’s not—I don’t regret that we also got into the current implications.
[Speaker D] Okay, thank you very much. Great, goodbye.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Thank you very much.