Messianism – Rabbi Michael Avraham – Lesson 7

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[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, so that people shouldn’t, God forbid, come to bless the heads of the Zionist council together with the Kaiser. Okay, anyway, why did I remember that? Because the Or Sameach, for example, at a certain stage, as I said, suggested that Agudat Israel should join the Zionist movement. Meaning, he thought they should join as a unit, as a bloc within the Zionist movement. The same thing happened—after all, the ones who founded Agudat Israel were, of course, the Yekkes. They recruited all the great rabbis of the generation from Eastern Europe—the Chafetz Chaim and Rabbi Chaim Ozer and everyone else—because they needed someone to sit up front. They didn’t really have Torah scholars of that stature themselves, so they brought them in, imported them from Eastern Europe. But the only ones who could actually do anything were the Yekkes. In other words, the yeshivot of Eastern Europe and the Haredim couldn’t do anything except learn. So what happened there? The Yekkes took them and set them up as scenery, the great rabbis there, with the Council of Torah Sages—they established them—but the ones who ran the whole thing were the Yekkes. You can read the memoirs of Yaakov Rosenheim, who was one of the founders of Agudat Israel. His views were very open, very far from what Agudat Israel would later represent. His descendants today, of course, are no longer Haredi; they’re Religious Zionists, the ones I know at least. Surely there are other descendants, but the ones I know are Religious Zionists. Same thing with Breuer, by the way. Breuer, as the grandson of Rabbi Hirsch—few of his descendants are Haredi, meaning most of them are Religious Zionists of various shades. Everyone I know, basically. Maybe I only know those, but still… And that’s basically how they were then. What? And that’s basically how they were then. Right, in a certain sense, in a certain sense that’s how they were then, because the camps still weren’t clearly defined. You could find yourself on one side or the other without really understanding what kind of label you were putting on your head. Look at Breuer—Breuer was a clear nationalist, meaning he was a nationalist, Breuer. You can read his books, nationalist books. Meaning, the goal was to establish a state here—obviously a Haredi one, under Agudat Israel, not with the Zionists, God forbid—but to establish a state here, and all the ideas were completely Zionist. The whole issue was only cooperation and within what framework to do it. Anyway, at a certain point they also wanted to split from Agudat Israel, and some did split. It seems to me that that’s even how Mizrachi was founded. If I remember correctly—I’m not one hundred percent sure, but that’s what I think—some part of Agudat Israel, the Yekke branch of Agudat Israel, decided to leave Agudat Israel and join the Zionist movement, and that was really the beginning of practical political Mizrachi. Ideologically, fine, that was much earlier—Rabbi Reines and all those—but that was long before. What? The Yekkes founded both Agudat Israel and Mizrachi? Right, right, both. They founded whatever could be founded because they were the ones who knew what to do, they were the ones who knew how to move things. The others knew how to learn Talmud or be wagon drivers; the Yekkes knew how to move things. And that’s… lots of Yekkes also built things here in the Land of Israel too, meaning they have many merits here. People laugh at them, but okay.

Anyway, back to our topic: I’m saying that the compartmentalization between the different streams over the years became sharper and sharper. Back then it was really not clear, and even when you read the history, it depends whom you read. In other words, history is painted in whatever colors people choose to paint it, and that doesn’t always reflect reality itself. Again, I also feed off books, but I tried to read from several angles to get some more balanced impression. So the Haredi criticism of the Zionist movement was definitely framed in terms of false messianism. In other words, the language, or the conceptual framework within which they discussed this phenomenon, was a framework of false messianism, and they pointed to various characteristics of false messianism when relating to Zionism. Zionism—and by the way, not all of them are absurd. A good number maybe are, but not all. There are points that, I don’t know, you need to pay attention to.

So of course the first thing is the Three Oaths, the classic thing. The Holy One, blessed be He, adjured Israel with three oaths. The Talmud in Ketubot: that they should not ascend like a wall, and not rebel against the nations, and not force the end. There’s a version there in Rashi, “that they should not distance the end,” which of course reverses the meaning. But the feeling was that they had gone against the oaths. Fine—about the oaths there were already various pilpulim even a little earlier. There’s even the Avnei Nezer who discusses this, saying these oaths can’t be decisive—there is the commandment of settling the Land of Israel. And there is Tosafot that brings these Three Oaths, Chaim Cohen in Ketubot brings these Three Oaths, and he says that today there is no commandment of settling the Land of Israel because of the oaths. They say, “Some mistaken student wrote this—it can’t be, there’s no such thing.” These Three Oaths are some kind of aggadic literature. Very few commentators, even before the Zionist period, really took this to the halakhic level. But even if you don’t see this as Jewish law, you can’t ignore the fact that there is some sort of instruction here, or an ethos within which people actually operated and all of us grew up, until a certain stage, according to which we are not supposed to do anything. Forget the gentiles, keep your head down until the messiah comes and redeems us, don’t do anything. And therefore the first stage of false messianism—the first stage, except that it wasn’t the first but the second, yes, B, what I said, that anyone who takes action to bring the messiah is already a kind of messianism—that was very strong there. Even before the question of secularity and what you’re doing—that came afterward. The initial feeling, it seems to me, was: what do you mean, you’re doing anything at all? It doesn’t matter in what framework, and with whom, and whether it’s secular or not secular. The very fact that people got up and did something was problematic: don’t force the end, or don’t rebel against the nations, just be quiet, keep your head down and be quiet, and that’s all. And immediately a discourse of false messianism begins.

And that really is an expression—and I’ll say again, today we hang everything on plots, and if you want to accuse Zionism you accuse it of everything. In my opinion it started the other way around. The authentic opposition wasn’t because of Zionism’s secularity. The authentic opposition was because of the oaths. The authentic opposition was because they dared to do anything at all. What do you mean we should do something? We’re in exile until they bring us back. Now, without getting into the sources and whether this is required by the sources or not—that’s not the point—but the ethos definitely was like that. And the great innovation of Zionism was first of all that people were actually doing something. After that we can talk about secular, religious, what they’re doing, whether it’s okay or not. First of all, the fact that they were doing something already broke something. And that itself, in my opinion, aroused the first opposition.

On top of that opposition, once it started to become clear that things weren’t so simple, and all in all, even before the argument about the Zionist movement, things had already been written—as I said before with the Avnei Nezer—saying that these Three Oaths, with all due respect, are not something you can really build a state on, or oppose the building of a state on. Is it connected to the chances of success of the opposition? What? Was the opposition related to the chances of the thing actually happening? I think that’s always part of the issue, because once something like this begins, obviously everyone understands that at the start it has no chance. It sounds crazy. We’ve been in this situation for two thousand years, and suddenly some assimilated journalist like Herzl comes along and starts some movement with his fantasies—there’s no chance. But I don’t know if that’s all it was. It’s beyond that. That’s why I said—I classified all the levels of false messianism, I ran through several suggestions—in my opinion already the second proposal was on the table there. Meaning, the very fact that they did something aroused opposition immediately. Even before the question of who was doing it and how they were doing it. Afterward of course you could strengthen the opposition much more by pointing out, “Look who’s doing it too—secular Jews who are turning Israel away from its religion, and heretics who are leading this thing, and look what’s happening in the settlements,” and all sorts of things of that kind, all of which was true. But in my opinion that wasn’t the root of the matter.

As far as I can tell—again, I’m not a historian, but I’ve read quite a bit about those periods—I get the impression that the root of the opposition really was theological, not practical; not that they didn’t want secularity. That came later. When you’re looking for something against someone, of course you look for all the points where you can attack him, and then secularity comes in too, and the conduct, and everything. Is it only about secularity there? I’m asking about the chances of the thing happening. I said, that too—even that, in my opinion, although it’s closer to clause B. Secularity is already clause C. But I’m saying even that, in my opinion, wasn’t the root, although again, it’s always mixed together, I don’t know, it’s hard to pinpoint exactly how. They expected the Messiah son of David to come on a white donkey, gather us all, calm down the gentiles, take us to Jerusalem, rebuild the Temple, and everything would be fine. That was the ethos people grew up on, absolutely. Look at the aliyah of the students of the Vilna Gaon and the Hasidim and so on. That was a pioneering act. Nobody imagined that this was something that was going to bring the messiah, obviously. What they discussed in private, yes, they talked about the messianic potential in it. But that wasn’t the point; it was the commandment of settling the Land of Israel. If they had made calculations that this was the end—right, so I said, there was a certain vanguard, a certain leadership that was also motivated by that—but the phenomenon as a phenomenon was the commandment of settling the Land of Israel. Fine, okay, the commandment of settling the Land of Israel—that’s okay. There were no political agendas there at all. They made no political efforts at all. They simply came here, and that was it. Calculations—they made calculations, fine, in books we know how to do everything. But their actions were not messianic actions. They simply immigrated and fulfilled the commandment of settling the Land of Israel.

By the way, the same was true in the sixteenth century. Morgenstern writes about this in his books—Arie Morgenstern, whom I mentioned. When they came to Safed and Tiberias in the sixteenth century after the expulsion, after the expulsion from Spain—in the sixteenth, seventeenth century—there was a very clear and very strong messianic background. Meaning, there are midrashim saying that the messiah will first come from the north—I don’t remember exactly what those midrashim are, maybe the Kuzari brings them, I think—and therefore many kabbalists actually came specifically to the north and not to Jerusalem in that wave of immigration. They wanted to meet the messiah there first and then go with him to Jerusalem. But I’m saying that in the end these processes were not political processes. In other words, even if in the background there was some calculation of redemption and maybe the messiah would come and so on, the only actions you took for redemption were gematrias and books and incantations. But in the end you immigrated to the Land of Israel. Yes, that you did—but there was no political activity, no public call, “Come, let’s establish a state here,” no lobbying with gentile governments and all kinds of things of that kind. Not to mention defense forces, of course, and creating an army and things like that—there’s no comparison at all, it’s as far apart as east from west. So that wasn’t it. There were messianic backgrounds there, but you can’t say they took actions to bring the messiah. They immigrated to the Land of Israel, but immigrating to the Land of Israel is not bringing the messiah. Immigrating to the Land of Israel is the commandment of settling the Land of Israel. That’s part of Jewish law, not connected to the messiah. That’s something you have to do regardless of the messiah. On the contrary: the fact that people didn’t do it until now—that’s a major accusation. The Kuzari already speaks about this. Yes, in the Kuzari the king asks the rabbi there: you keep saying, yes, asking the Holy One, blessed be He, to let you ascend to the Land of Israel, and you don’t do anything. He says to him, “You have shamed me, O King of the Khazars.” Yes, he says that there twice, I think, on two issues.

There’s also the debate about “Seeking Zion,” Rabbi Kalisher, and offering sacrifices. Yes, that also starts from Rabbi Akiva Eiger and Rabbi Gutmacher, who was his student. Yes, there was Rabbi Gutmacher and Rabbi Kalisher. But those are heralds of Zionism. That’s not yet really a Zionist movement. Those are more like thinkers, but the political movement began a little later. They also weren’t Yekkes, at least some of them weren’t. But the one who officially started the political movement was a Yekke. So I’m saying that opposition to this movement was framed as false messianism, and it started from almost the deepest root. I’m not saying Leibowitz and Ben-Gurion, that anyone who waits for the messiah is a messianic movement, but yes: anyone who does something to bring the messiah. Even before the question of what exactly you do, the very fact that you’re taking realistic, practical action to bring the messiah makes you immediately suspect. And that’s obvious—it was there very clearly.

Not only that, even those who were partners in this movement felt the need to apologize. In other words, it was clear that this was some sort of ethos that wasn’t trivial. And you had to explain that maybe it was permissible, and maybe this was only settling the Land of Israel and not bringing the messiah. There were various apologies of that sort, explanations. It’s not something you can dismiss. That’s why I think the Zionist movement, even if maybe one can reach the conclusion that it isn’t really a messianic movement at all—possibly, I’m not one hundred percent sure, we’ll discuss that later—it still reflects how people see what a messianic movement is. In other words, the criticism of the Zionist movement reflected the question of what the criteria are for classifying a movement as messianic. And here we see that the criteria go almost all the way. The very fact that you do something already means you’re in the dangerous zone, you’re already suspect.

Why is it a problem simply because it’s messianic? What? Why is it a problem just because it’s messianic? What do you mean? By a “messianic movement” in quotation marks I mean a problematic movement, not a messianic movement in the sense of “I believe in the coming of the messiah.” There is false messianism and true messianism. Fine—that’s what accompanies the whole discussion. I’m just saying: how do you define it? There is such a thing as false messianism, so how do you define it? I presented several definitions, each one below the previous. I said: there are those who define it—Ben-Gurion and Leibowitz—that anyone who believes in the messiah is messianic. Fine, that’s not a plausible interpretation within the religious context. But the next interpretation, which even today many people would not agree to, still—you have to remember that the ethos was indeed like that—that anyone who does something, that already makes it a messianic movement. In principle, that the Temple will descend from heaven—messianic. A messianic movement in the sense of the negative connotation. When I say “messianic movement,” I mean with the negative connotation. Okay? Now I’m saying: today many people don’t think that way. I don’t think that way either, by the way. But you can’t ignore the fact that this was the basis of the first criticism of the Zionist movement. In other words, you can see that in the ethos that developed—and again, you can reject it despite the fact that it developed; I’m not claiming that therefore it’s right—but clearly it was there. The very fact that they did something, the very fact that you took action instead of being idle—after all, the traditional Jewish world was always accused of a certain kind of idleness. That wasn’t for nothing. Idleness was part of the ideology. We have to perform commandments and learn and be righteous, and the Holy One, blessed be He, will help us. In principle, we are supposed to be among the “ten idlers.” That’s the basic ethos. So there is something very deep here. It’s not just some kind of helplessness or unfamiliarity with the world, as if they didn’t know how to do things. The fact that they didn’t know how to do things in Eastern Europe wasn’t only because they were lazy, but because there was an ideology of idleness. We’re not supposed to do anything. Initiative isn’t in the ethos at all. The Holy One, blessed be He, is supposed to handle the initiatives. “Why do you involve yourself in the hidden things of the Merciful One?” You study Torah, keep the commandments, do what you need to do, that’s all. Why are you running the world here—what is this megalomania? There is a very strong ethos like that.

Now in recent times we’ve become a bit freer from it, because once you are inside the Zionist process you can’t really remain inside it and continue clinging—almost can’t continue clinging—to that ethos. But that’s a birth process. In other words, it wasn’t like this, and something somewhat new was born here. And I’ll say again: that doesn’t mean the previous ethos was anchored in the sources and now this is a deviation from the sources. I didn’t say that. In the sources it’s hard to find a clear criterion here. But this certainly was the prevailing approach, certainly the simpler and more natural outlook.

By contrast, later a conception developed. It began as a return to the Land of Israel, and we have an opportunity to settle the Land of Israel, and until now we were idle and did not fulfill the commandment of settling the Land of Israel, and there they didn’t look toward the messiah. What’s called Reines-style Zionism, the Reines-style Religious Zionism of Rabbi Reines, who is viewed as representing secular Zionism—not secular Zionism, but religious Zionism without a hyphen, which, after Leibowitz, people later told me to say. In other words, Zionism not in a religious shade but in a national shade. And usually the one who represents that in the world of ideas is Reines. I don’t know his writings well enough, I haven’t read all of them, but that’s generally how people classify the views. At first Religious Zionism was more Reines-style, and little by little it developed—Rabbi Kook of course brought this in very strongly, much later. He brought in very strongly the messianic dimension, the dimension of redemption, of joining the Zionist movement as part of bringing the redemption and as a religious value—which, by the way, are also two different things. Religious value and bringing redemption are not identical things. Because Rabbi Reines—I’m not sure, not one hundred percent sure—but maybe he didn’t even see it as a religious value. Not only not bringing—living in the Land of Israel is the commandment of settling the Land of Israel, that’s obvious. But bringing the people, or creating some movement—that could be national liberation. That’s not necessarily something with religious value, and certainly not necessarily the need for redemption as such.

So I think that in the Religious Zionist world too, this whole matter took time to ripen, and for the same reason: because taking action to bring the messiah at first was something not so legitimate. Why, in the end, did people join this process? Little by little a conception developed, or this ideology crystallized, saying that in fact—why not? There is Rashi versus Nachmanides, I brought it there in tractate Sukkah, whether the Temple will descend from heaven or whether we will build it. And somehow people suddenly began to say, wait a second, who says? Why can’t I do something, so long as it’s action within the framework of Jewish law and doesn’t deviate? And here we come to clause C, yes? A form of conduct that is forceful, or unrealistic, or that certainly deviates from Jewish law. But as long as I’m not in clause C and only in clause B, then little by little it crystallized. And therefore we see that the criteria I set for a messianic movement—A, B, C, where in C there are one, two, and three—actually begin to crystallize along these criteria. In other words, at first clause B was itself a messianic movement. That’s clear. Afterward suddenly there was an argument about it. In Satmar, for example, they still think clause B is a messianic movement. Anyone who does anything at all. And Satmar fights against the wicked Zionists, and it’s not because they’re secular. They use the fact that they’re secular because it strengthens the criticism, but it’s not because of that—it’s because they are doing anything at all. That’s the ideology.

But today it’s already less clear-cut. Certainly in the Religious Zionist world that’s definitely not true. But I think that even in the Haredi world, anyone who isn’t in the Satmar or Neturei Karta pole—if you ask them on an ideological level, though people there aren’t very occupied with ideology. But I said, the Haredi public is a very non-ideological public, the non-Satmar Haredi public. Still, if you ask them, they might tell you this is false messianism. Practically, though, in my opinion, they’re not there anymore. They are part of this movement and wait for the messiah to come at the end—that’s perfectly fine. I don’t think they’re there anymore, at least de facto. Clause B has dropped off the table in most of the religious public, I think. Clause C is now what stands at the center of the argument.

So notice, in this picture, there’s a process of conquest—sorry, conquest of one more plot and another plot out of the criteria of false messianism—until we reach a situation where joining a movement that desecrates the Sabbath and causes people to leave Torah, which already borders really on C3, meaning deviation from religion—it borders on it and even really is there—and even that today is already perceived not as a messianic movement. So what is left of the concept of a messianic movement? I’m speaking within the Religious Zionist world. What is left of the concept of a messianic movement if even that isn’t one? If even that isn’t a messianic movement? There’s almost nothing left. So you have to understand that it’s not trivial to say, “No, no, it’s not a messianic movement, everything is fine.” Because if we are not a messianic movement within this framework, I don’t know what a messianic movement is. You can say absurd things, do bizarre and forceful things—but what, it’s permitted to violate Torah, and only forbidden to do forceful things? The hierarchy seemed, as before, first C2 and then C3—first to do bizarre or unrealistic things, and afterward to do things that deviate from Jewish law, like Shabbetai Tzvi and all that. To reverse that order doesn’t sound trivial, right? It’s not so simple. So I’m saying there is some ideological challenge here. I wouldn’t call it a religious challenge, because, as I said, this doesn’t so much belong to halakhic and religious thought. But maybe a religious challenge, not a halakhic one. There is some non-trivial ideological challenge here. Namely, to define the concept of a messianic movement when the Zionist movement is not there.

And in that sense it’s easier for Haredi thought, because whatever characteristics of a messianic movement you want, you’ll find some of them in the Zionist movement. In these proportions, in those proportions, but you’ll find something. If you want to portray it as something completely clean of the concept of a messianic movement, you almost leave no possibility at all for defining a messianic movement. If you think that none of the characteristics are there. The point is that of course it’s a question of degrees. So fine, there are messianic elements—but the heap paradox, right? The question is how much messianism has to be in a movement before I declare it a messianic movement. The fact that there are characteristics, and some people think this way and others think that way, and every group has characteristics in different intensities—still, in the bottom line, you can say that this isn’t a messianic movement. That’s a statement one can maybe live with more easily. But if you want to clean it out entirely, to say that everything here is not messianic, I don’t know what that leaves of the concept of a messianic movement.

Until then, the messianic movement always had some messiah, some sort of Shabbetai Tzvi—there was a persona. So I’m saying even at the level of a persona—and here I’ll bring some sources on this issue. For example, Herzl. Let’s take Herzl, right? If you look at descriptions—Rabbi Meir Bar-Ilan, I brought here a passage from his book From Volozhin to Jerusalem, memoirs of Rabbi Meir Bar-Ilan, the son of the Netziv. And he writes like this: “There are personalities who in their lifetimes are like a legend, so that while they walk among people, those who see their virtues and their faults, as with all human beings, nevertheless relate to them as something not ordinary.” Even though you see the fault, you can’t believe he has a fault. Even though he’s with you and you see him up close, yes? “Not as a man, but as a chapter of history.” And Herzl merited this. Legends wrapped around him while he was still young and fresh, healthy and strong. The man died at age forty-four, I think, so he wasn’t very old. At least everyone thought he was healthy and strong, even when he wasn’t, yes? “When it was heard that Herzl was ill, no one believed it.” You can’t believe Herzl was sick—he’s a person, how can he be sick? Yes? “It was hard to believe that the man who embodied within himself not only life but revival was ill.” This is no longer just seeing and hearing that Herzl had flown past various Jewish cities and reached Petersburg before the era of airplanes. Like “tower and stockade” methods—really legends in the style of Shabbetai Tzvi that were spread there.

Now, I’m not saying Herzl encouraged this. I don’t know what his attitude was to these legends. We talked about the Lubavitcher Rebbe. But in the public, legends of this sort spread. Okay? Everything Herzl did, every place he traveled—to Constantinople, to Jerusalem, to Rome, to London—people interpreted it all through every level of interpretation. Everything was according to verses and hints and Kabbalah, and every step he took generated all kinds of legends. By the way, that’s not so far from what some circles do today—not specifically about Bibi, but about the state or about what the state does. So I’m saying there are things here that completely recall what happened around the false messiahs I described in previous sessions. Again, I’m saying, that doesn’t mean Herzl directed it. I don’t think so. I don’t know, I haven’t investigated enough. But it doesn’t seem to me that he intended this to happen. But probably with masses this is how it works. So it’s no wonder that when you look at this movement from the outside you say, wow, there are elements here of a messianic movement.

Look at the language of Rabbi David Friedman of Karlin, one of the greatest halakhic decisors, Rabbi David Friedman. He says: “My opinion on this matter is known: that this approach should be considered the approach of Shabbetai Tzvi—may the name of the wicked rot.” He’s speaking about Zionism. “As the false prophets sound the trumpet blast in favor of Herzl, prophesying in the false spirit of Shabbetai Tzvi.” Meaning, he sees Herzl as some sort of Shabbetai Tzvi—legends around him, he goes to speak with emperors and dukes and kings and does lobbying. First of all, this man will bring disaster upon us. But that, I’m saying, is stage B. First of all, he is doing something at all—that’s the problematic thing first. After that, someone who does something, and people looking at it say, this will bring disaster on us—according to them, that emperor may end up deciding to chop all our heads off because of this insolent fellow. Is he crazy? Let him sit quietly until the messiah comes. That’s basically the point. And then of course they move on to his secularity and to…

I’m saying it all gets built up; in the end you get all the way there, but it doesn’t start there. It starts from the finer points. Likewise Rabbi Elchanan Wasserman writes, in his Kovetz Ma’amarim, in “In the Footsteps of the Messiah,” of course, that famous pamphlet of his. “The Jewish people always suffers from two things: from outside, blood libels; and from within, false messiahs, who from the beginning seduce and promise to bring people up to the Land of Israel, and the end of all false messiahs is apostasy for thousands and tens of thousands of Jews.” “Look with penetrating eyes and you will see that in our own time too this false messiah exists, clothed in the well-known sect, which says with its mouth that it will lead us to the Land of Israel, but in truth it leads to complete heresy, may the Merciful One save us.” And after all, you can’t ignore the fact that within the Zionist movement a great many people left observance of the commandments. You can debate what was cause and what was effect—I’m not at all sure about the direction. Of course there were people of this kind and people of that kind. But in general I’m not at all sure that because of Zionism they left the commandments. Rather, Zionism gave them the opportunity to do so.

Look, Rabbi Meir Bar-Ilan in that same book describes how he boarded a ship in the port of Odessa, on his way to America. And he says that people boarded the ship—Odessa was a city of enlightenment figures anyway, but never mind, it was the port people came to from all over. Everyone boarded in traditional dress, Haredi families boarded the ship. The moment their feet stepped onto the ship, you didn’t see a Haredi garment. Everyone took off the clothes, removed the head covering, took everything off on the ship. He says, that very day. They threw the tefillin into the sea. Yes, yes. Nothing remained. Is that the deviation from Jewish law the rabbi is talking about? What? Is that the deviation from Jewish law the rabbi is talking about? Yes, but ideologically it’s not there. What? Ideologically it’s not there. That’s why I’m saying: in practice—first of all, ideologically too it existed among some people. What, the very cooperation? Certainly. Not only the cooperation, but this Zionism, secular Zionism—in its ideology was also, among other things, the secularization of people. Certainly. The culture controversy in all its forms in the Zionist congresses—I don’t know exactly where that was. The culture controversy, which Herzl was sober enough not to enter into and to detach the Zionist movement from culture, but Ben-Gurion didn’t agree. It seems to me Weizmann also at first didn’t agree. They wanted to bring culture into the Zionist movement. What is “culture”? That the Zionist movement should also have a minister of education and culture, and not only a minister of defense and politics or transportation. In other words, that the Zionist movement would also manage education and values and everything—and you understand where that was going if Ben-Gurion and Weizmann are managing the culture.

Yes, but to characterize the Religious Zionist explanation of Zionism as a messianic movement… No, here I’m talking about Zionism in general. Religious Zionism certainly did not want to secularize people. But I’m saying, when you look at the Zionist movement, you say: you Religious Zionists… cutting off sidelocks, yes. That’s why, by the way, this myth of cutting off sidelocks—not a myth, it happened—in the 1950s, which in my opinion was greatly blown out of proportion. They did it, of course, I assume, to a few dozen, maybe even a few hundred children from Tehran and things like that. But it became some sort of Haredi ethos, as if the whole Zionist movement did nothing but cut off children’s sidelocks. That came against this background. But that’s already in the 1950s, after the state was established; I’m talking now. But it started from the criticism there, that basically what you want is to cut off our sidelocks. So now all of a sudden—there, now we see that’s what they’re doing. You see? Our rabbis already foresaw this fifty years or seventy years ago—together with all those who foresaw the Holocaust. And of course everyone foresaw the Holocaust after it happened. Everyone foresaw the Holocaust afterward. They pull out their writings from before the Holocaust, but they pull them out after the Holocaust, and there they find that they foresaw the Holocaust. Because when you foresee enough things, you’ll also foresee the Holocaust. You can foresee anything, just write enough things that you “foresee.” What’s his name? Nostradamus, yes, Nostradamus. If you predict enough things, some of them will come true—that’s just simple statistics. That’s how all those people with stars and things like that work; one out of a hundred will be right.

Of course here too I brought Rabbi Shach, for example, writing in a later period: “We must believe that the coming of the messiah, and even the beginning of redemption, cannot come through such channels, from people who have no relation and no connection to the Torah of Israel. And we must believe that redemption is not connected with desecration of the Sabbath and uprooting commandments. This is false messianism.” You tell me that this will bring redemption—that is false messianism. And notice, this is false messianism not in terms of the result, but in the mode of conduct. I don’t know what will happen in the end, whether the messiah will come or not, and it doesn’t even interest me. I see how you are conducting yourselves right now: this is a messianic movement, and this is false messianism. Now of course he says that if it is false messianism then it won’t be realized either. In other words, redemption won’t come in the end. But he doesn’t wait to see that it fails and only then decide it’s false messianism. Rather, from their mode of conduct in real time, he determines that this is false messianism.

Now Rabbi Kalisher, for example, confronts this. He is among the earliest of the supporters of this process, and he already confronts this claim, because it is a weighty claim. So Rabbi Kalisher writes: “Let the thinker not imagine that suddenly the Lord will descend from heaven to earth, for little by little the redemption of Israel will come. The beginning of redemption is through the awakening of generous people and through the willingness of kingdoms to gather the scattered of Israel to the holy land.” He speaks there also about the possibility that it could come through people who are not observant. Rabbi Waldenberg, in a much later period, the Tzitz Eliezer—his position between Zionist and Haredi is very unclear. There are controversies about this. His children try to portray him as completely Haredi. He himself, I don’t know exactly if that classification is right. It’s always within the framework of rewriting history. “There is no room at all for the claim that it is impossible for heavenly deliverance to grow through people in whose hearts there is no fear of God. There is no source for this, no basis for this. Because aside from the fact that this is internally falsified—for it is clear that to the extent that the immigration of Torah-observant Jews increases, so too the power of influence of faithful Judaism in the institutions of the state will increase, until over time efforts to change things for the better, with God’s help, will be crowned with success. Aside from this, who can enter the secret of divine providence and fathom the Almighty? Have we not already had such a thing in history, that when there was no restraint and no support, God sent His help from holiness through a wicked king of Israel, to broaden the borders of the land and settle there masses of the Jewish people?”

He says theoretically: what is your source? We’ve already seen things like this. More than that—and this is an argument that later, in my debates in Bnei Brak, I always said, and it’s good to see him writing it here—it’s not only that secularity doesn’t… you say secularity cannot bring redemption; you cause this movement to be secular, and therefore it won’t be able to bring redemption. If the religious public had joined this movement, then it would not have been a secular movement. Why is it secular? Because the religious people stayed outside. Why is it a secular movement? If you had been there, you could have influenced it from within, and then maybe it wouldn’t have been a secular movement. And then, according to your own view—that a secular movement cannot bring redemption—the one who caused the movement to be secular is you.

The issue of military service, the secularization of those who enlist—in Bnei Brak I always had arguments about these matters. I told them that the ones causing them to become secular are you, not the army. Because once you educate someone in such a way that whoever goes into the army becomes secular, then when will he go to the army? After he has decided to become secular. Otherwise he wouldn’t go there, right? Well, that’s obvious. In other words, go and see: where people are not educated that way, those who reach the army do not necessarily become secular. And the stronger the religious indoctrination, the less secularization there is. There is some secularization in the army from every public, but in Mercaz HaRav, for example, where they see this as some sort of ideal, “the garments of the High Priest,” and things like that—people who enlist from Mercaz HaRav, I think there’s basically zero secularization there. Maybe I don’t know, there’s surely one or two, but it’s utterly negligible. Zero. The hesder track in Mercaz? The hesder track in Mercaz is pretty easy. No, fine, but still you’re there for nine months, I don’t know, something like that. Fine. So where’s the secularization? Why don’t you just sign for another three years and that’s it, and then go back to yeshiva? The army secularizes, after all—it turns Israel away from its religion, as everyone knows. That’s what it was founded for.

Abarbanel writes that kingship will turn into heresy; after all, the Sages already say this about the footsteps of the messiah. Who said that this process cannot be brought by people who aren’t committed? This really is an invention with no basis. And therefore I think it truly doesn’t start there. It starts from two points. It starts from one point of false messianism in the fact that you are doing something at all. And afterward, to strengthen the criticism, they say that you are also secular and all kinds of things like that. And from another point, which is later, it starts with: “I want to oppose the secularity within this matter.” Maybe they’ll bring the messiah, I don’t know, but I don’t want my people joining that movement, because otherwise I’ll lose them. So I say that even the messiah can’t arrive in such a way, and I harness that argument too in the direction of false messianism. But at root, I don’t think it really started there. And this theological notion—that it can’t be that someone who doesn’t observe commandments will bring redemption—it didn’t start there. You harness that claim to one of those two roots.

Even the religious apologies—for example, if you look at Rabbi Shmuel Yaakov Rabinovitch of Aleksot, one of the leaders of Religious Zionism, who wrote a work called Religion and Nationalism. He writes there: “The Zionist movement has no connection or resemblance whatsoever to the movements of the false messiahs,” and he writes as someone who belongs to that movement, “who misled many of our people in various times and periods.” Why? Several explanations. “It does not err in illusions and fantasies.” A realistic movement, right? Here you see the criterion. “It does not force the end,” it does not do unrealistic things. Okay? “And it does not say that we should do things beyond our capacity.” Fine. Up to here that fits what I said. But look at the concluding sentence: “Nor does it touch in any way the true faith in the messiah awaited at the end of days.” They’re not doing this in order to bring the messiah at all. It has nothing to do with the messiah. The messiah is a religious matter. I join them because I have a national vision. I’m also Jewish in the national sense, not only in the religious sense. And I join them—that’s like Reines, this is basically Reines-style Religious Zionism. And therefore they are not bringing the messiah; it is not a messianic movement by definition, despite all the characteristics, because they are not here for the messiah.

Now again, the very fact that even someone from Religious Zionism who joins this movement finds it necessary to apologize in this way means that even those who belong to the Zionist movement accept that taking action to bring the messiah is a messianic movement. Because he says that beyond the fact that they are not deceived by illusions, and all the criteria on the merits, they do not want to bring the messiah at all. What do you want from them? In other words, he goes all the way to B. He says they have none of the characteristics—not B, not C1, not C2, and not C3. Okay? They have none of that. In other words, not even B. Later, at a later stage, as I said, Rabbi Kook and the more messianic Religious Zionism say: not true, B is not a messianic movement. But the first people there who join the Zionist movement, Religious Zionism says: B is a messianic movement—but we are not B. We’re not doing it to bring the messiah. We’re not taking actions to bring the messiah. We just want to return to the Land of Israel within the framework of the Springtime of Nations; we just want to have the life of a people like every other people, of course with the commandment of settling the Land of Israel, the specific, personal religious aspect, not the eschatological, not the historical movement—that yes. But to bring the messiah? Of course not. This movement does not want to bring the messiah. And that’s a very interesting apology, because it’s an apology from the defenders, not the attackers. And you see how deeply this ethos was ingrained—that anyone who does anything is a messianic movement. You have to explain that you are doing nothing to bring the messiah in order to escape the criticism, even if you are already inside the movement, not someone criticizing from outside. And that is interesting.

Korman, for example, writes—yes, Korman, the older people here surely know him, you maybe less so. Korman wrote some books on Jewish thought, controversies of Judaism and science, and things like that. He was ahead of his generation by quite a bit, an autodidact, a Tel Aviv Jew. I don’t know exactly what he did professionally, but a social worker. A social worker. And he wrote all kinds of books on Jewish thought, which in our time was what there was. Meaning, even for me, and certainly for the generation before me, there wasn’t much more than that. That was the literature available on Jewish thought, on confronting other ideas. There was Immanuel Hartom, Aharon Bart with Our Generation Facing the Questions of Eternity. There was very little. So Korman was one who really dealt with these things. So he says here: “A person who claims or hints that he is the messiah”—he writes this in response to the first edition of Hamburger’s book. That’s really a very recent book. So Korman was probably already at the end of his life then. He says: “A person who claims or hints that he is the messiah in the sense of the chosen one of God, to bring redemption to the Jewish people, even though providence did not choose him for this and did not inform him by prophecy that he is the redeemer—such a person is a false messiah. A person who appears with a plan in hand, how to help or save Jews in a practical and natural way, is not included in the concept of a false messiah, because he does not claim at all to be such.”

Now here there’s room for a bit of hesitation. Because he would be telling me this: if he had said—and it’s a bit strange to parse his language this closely, but I think it’s not over-parsing, it’s really what he writes. He says: if someone says he is the messiah even though he was not informed by prophecy that he is the messiah, he says he is the divine redeemer—that is a false messiah, clearly. The antithesis I would expect would be: but if a person really brings redemption, even though no prophecy informed him that he is the messiah, but he contributes to bringing redemption—that isn’t a false messiah. But he doesn’t write that. He says that someone who has a program to save the Jews—again, the national dimension, just like the previous source—that isn’t redemption. We’re talking about the messiah, and he is not bringing the messiah.

Now I’m already talking deep into the period of the state. Hamburger’s first edition, in my opinion, came out in the 1980s. In the 1980s, I think. The first edition of Hamburger was in the 1980s. So when he writes this as a response, we’re talking about thirty years ago, thirty-five years ago, roughly. Something like that. Up to then, the defensive discourse of Religious Zionism was still: we are not coming to bring the messiah at all. That’s not the point. And this is already long after Rabbi Kook, of course. Fifty years after Rabbi Kook died. Thirty years after the Chazon Ish. So again you see here—in his time this was of course no longer agreed upon. There was already… But still, say, Mercaz HaRav at the beginning of the 1980s was a Haredi yeshiva with a few little add-ons. The more Zionist period of Mercaz HaRav had already begun, more or less, but not very long before that. In other words, there still wasn’t really a strong stream in the wake of Rabbi Kook. Rabbi Kook did not yet have the status he has today. And therefore this was the Religious Zionist mainstream; it still spoke in such language. We’re talking about thirty-five years ago.

When you say he spoke in that language, are you being judgmental? Are you saying it was good or bad? No, no, no, I’m describing. I’m describing. He speaks in a language that accepts B as a messianic movement. I don’t agree with that, but I’m not judging. Now, why really was there a need—some group of Jews established a state, brought about national liberation and so on—why must that be the beginning of redemption? No, it doesn’t have to be. The question is whether they forbade it from being that. I have no problem with “must”—I also think it doesn’t have to be, on the contrary. My own Zionism really isn’t messianic. I’m only claiming that even someone whose Zionism is messianic is not a false messiah. That’s what I’m claiming. You understand? In other words, he assumes that this accusation really would place him under the category of false messianism. That’s why he has to say, “I’m not going to bring the messiah.” I claim: I am a Zionist not in order to bring the messiah; I am a Zionist for purely national reasons. I have no problem with that view. I’m only claiming that even someone who goes in order to bring the messiah is not false messianism. I disagree with him, but I don’t think that means this is a messianic movement or that there is some problem here. I disagree with his theology. Fine? What? A legitimate dispute. But in their very self-defense they are, in part, conceding. In other words, they agree that taking action to bring the messiah contains a problem of false messianism, and therefore they are trying to cleanse Religious Zionism of that stain, as it were.

Today this is no longer a relevant discourse—quite the opposite. Today whoever says otherwise belongs to the critics. I find myself in that slot, not because I say that, but only because I say I am not a Zionist in order to bring the messiah. I’m not claiming that someone who is a Zionist in order to bring the messiah is false messianism—I definitely do not agree with that—but I am not a Zionist in order to bring the messiah. And that is already perceived as some kind of denial of the essence of Religious Zionism. In other words, the discourse has undergone quite a major reversal over the past several decades. You are aware of that. I’m talking about years of my own life when I already had my own opinions, so I’m not all that old.

Rabbi Kook, for example, says: “What they want they themselves do not know”—speaking about the pioneers. “They themselves do not know how deeply connected they are to the spirit of Israel, to the spirit of God, so that even one who says that he has no need at all for the spirit of God, since he says that he desires the spirit of Israel, the divine spirit already dwells within the holy interior of his aspiration, even against his own will.” What does that mean? He says they do not think they are bringing the messiah, but they are bringing him—they just don’t know it. Not only do they not know that they are bringing him, they also do not know that they want to bring him. They have some hidden desire, some kind of false consciousness, in more modern terms. So the claim is that in fact they do want to bring—the inner, Jewish, deep point of the pioneers, even though they are disconnected from it, is really some sort of desire to bring the messiah, and they have indeed brought the messiah. In other words, both of those claims.

This is of course the exact opposite. He says: this is a messianic movement out in the open, but not in a negative sense. Not in a negative sense, of course. We are taking actions to bring the messiah, even with secular people, even with Sabbath desecrators, even with those who want to turn Israel away from its religion. Yes, there were such people among them who wanted to do that, obviously. And still Rabbi Kook says: and still yes, and this is not like false messianism. This is already the opposite pole. And again, in chronological terms, Rabbi Kook was long before Korman, of course—several decades, maybe fifty years earlier or more. But Rabbi Kook’s view became established or took root as something fundamental, or as the Religious Zionist mainstream, very late. Very late. Okay.

So in essence, when the Haredi criticism attacks Zionism on the messianic issue, it of course talks about forcefulness, about attitude toward the body—I think I mentioned this—Max Nordau, who took from Bar Kokhba the attitude toward the body, training Jewish youth to build muscles, and the Bar Kokhba movement of the Zionist movement, meaning Zionist sports. He criticized that: what are you busy with, the body? What is the rabbi busy with, the body? He wants to protect me, an army, he wants to defend, healthy farmers, he wants a healthy soul in a healthy body—what’s wrong with that? Clearly, when you hear this language of forcefulness, you see it as some sort of expression of messianism, as a messianic movement. The moment you speak to me in the language of forcefulness, that’s already Bar Kokhba—“Don’t help and don’t hinder,” as it were, the Holy One, blessed be He. “My power and the might of my hand.” We hear this criticism all the time, “my power and the might of my hand.” And behind all this sits the criticism of false messianism. Even the very execution itself is an indication of false messianism—it’s like Bar Kokhba.

Likewise with rebellion against the nations, which has no real basis. After all, there was a UN decision, they asked permission from all the nations before entering, and the Balfour Declaration. Basically, it is very hard to accuse the Zionist movement of some kind of activity that was delusional on the realpolitik level. True, they had a far-reaching vision. But that vision was so far-reaching mainly because the Haredi ethos was an ethos of idleness. Not Haredi—the Jewish ethos in general was an ethos of idleness, that one does nothing. Again, “idleness” not in a judgmental sense, but in the sense that we are not supposed to do anything, rather messianism should appear from above. So in that sense there really was a far-reaching vision here. But all in all, when you examine it on its merits, it was a vision implemented by political means, like very many peoples in the era of the Springtime of Nations. Of course the action was bolder, with smaller chances of success. You are going to another land where you haven’t been for two thousand years; you gather all kinds of people who have no connection with one another, different types of people, in different communities, in different places. In other words, it was more far-reaching than some European national movement or another—say Bismarck’s Germans, who united all the principalities of Germany in the middle of the nineteenth century. Fine. But they were already there. It was only a matter of awakening national spirit and producing a state from it. So true, not most of the Springtime of Nations movements were as far-reaching as the Zionist movement, but overall it used the same tools. Its point of departure was just weaker: they were dispersed, with less national consciousness, and more work had to be done. But overall they did it through political means, through practical effort. When they got here there were already threats, so they also created some kind of defense force—but clearly a defensive one, not a force intended to conquer, like we saw there, to announce “we are setting out on a campaign to conquer the land.” They were always trying to compromise—come, let’s make peace, let’s divide the land, let’s compromise. And everything they bought, they bought; they didn’t take anything by force. The whole ethos was the opposite ethos. So these accusations, in my opinion, are baseless. And therefore it is clear to me that they come from another basis. They come from some different basis: the very fact that you do something. It really doesn’t matter what you do.

Okay, so practically speaking, if we want to classify the Zionist movement on the basis of the classification I proposed earlier—just now I thought of it too—how did Eastern Jewry fit into all this over two hundred years? I don’t know that branch well enough, but I can tell you my impression. I’ve read less, know less about that side. There Zionism was completely natural. It wasn’t ideological at all. It wasn’t… Of course—the Land of Israel, what do you mean? We’re returning to the Land of Israel, we want to live with Jews. They never even made this distinction between messianism and Zionism and nationalism. That distinction was entirely foreign to them. We are part of the Jewish people, we want to return to the Land of Israel, we pray for it all the time, so we come. That’s all. By the way, that is also the weakness of Eastern Zionism, because Eastern Zionism did not initiate this move and did not really take an active part in it, except as soldiers and not as leadership, precisely because of that. Because to move things you need ideology. There it wasn’t ideology, it was… once there’s an opportunity, what, we won’t come to the Land of Israel? To live with Jews, to settle the land of our forefathers? Of course, it’s the most natural thing in the world. But to initiate it—to initiate it you need to be Western. In other words, you need to develop ideology, write books explaining it to everyone, debates about political Zionism, cultural Zionism, all kinds of labels for sub-streams within the movement. That’s a very ideological mode of conduct. In the Eastern world there was none of that at all. Not only among the Jews, by the way. There are no ideological movements in the East at all. There are religious movements, not ideological movements in the East—by East I mean the Near East, not the Far East. Ideology is a European concept. Ideologies were born and baptized in Europe. Mizrahim can join, but they do not think in ideological terms. That is simply not their way of thinking.

And on the one hand, because of that, they don’t struggle with all the soul-searching of the Ashkenazim—are we a messianic movement… What do you mean? Jews come to the Land of Israel, there is the commandment of settling the Land of Israel, the land of our forefathers—we’re here, finished. What’s the question? On the other hand, they can’t make it happen. They couldn’t bring this about. In my opinion this could not have come from there. And with all due respect to the Biton Committee and all the rest, Zionism is an Ashkenazi movement, and rightly so. The Ashkenazim made it. Nothing will help here. All the revisionism in the world won’t help. They joined when they could, everything is fine, everything is wonderful, I’m very happy. But you can’t whitewash this difference; that’s just nonsense. Before the Holocaust the Jews in Eastern lands were a large part. Fine, true, and there were pogroms in Europe. Very good, but even the part that initiated this in Europe was a small group. If you count from what group this initiative came, I don’t think it was larger than all the Jews in the East put together. Fine, but the small group was able to initiate and bring in the Jews from the West. Fine, whatever—it may be that now the process is being completed. Okay, I have no principled problem, I’m only saying there’s no need to alter the facts. One should recognize reality.

What about Chabad? What’s that? I already talked about Chabad last time. Yes, Chabad is a messianic movement even in the sense of having a persona, with all the legends—and the legends are directed from above. They don’t just arise from below, as with Herzl, as I think was the case with Herzl. There there are characteristics—I talked about it last time.

Okay, we’ll stop here. I’ll still complete this next time, and I think it will take us another session or two. Is there something like that with Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu, the Chief Rabbi of Israel? Oh yes? All those miracle stories there. Did Rabbi Eliyahu come from above? No, even there I’m not sure, although again, his son definitely encourages it a lot, that’s clear—Shmuel Eliyahu. Appointed as the leading rabbi of the generation by journalists. I don’t know. The booklet he’s putting out now, the whole controversy, as if that’s what it is.