Q&A: But Are We Guilty?
But Are We Guilty?
Question
Hello Rabbi,
Attached is an article by Ben Caspit from Maariv, in which he blames the general public for the actions of and dependent lifestyle of the Haredi public.
Does the Rabbi really think this is our fault?
Ben Caspit responds to Gafni about the speech: “We are not guilty! You are guilty!”
On one point Gafni is right: their unbelievable audacity is entirely our fault
It took the eternal chairman of the Finance Committee just 17 seconds to complain, without the slightest shame. We were not the ones who crowded them into neighborhoods and brought them to poverty, but we pampered them for years and got used to their culture of deprivation.
You have to watch this video again and again, and it is still hard to believe. Even the most talented writer of “A Wonderful Country” would not dare put such a text on his writing desk.
MK Moshe Gafni, the eternal chairman of the Knesset Finance Committee, the man with his hand on the national cash faucet, from the Knesset podium: “We are not guilty! You, who made us live in such crowding, you are guilty!! And there are still those here who dare come and attack us when the facts are not true. Nonsense. Thank you very much.”
It took him only 17 seconds to say these abominable words, loudly and without a shred of shame. Seventeen seconds containing the entire tragedy in a nutshell. The Haredim, says Gafni, are not guilty. They are not guilty for the high infection rate, they are not guilty for the insane number of deaths, they are not guilty for the wholesale opening of a considerable part of their education system, they are not guilty for their enormous morbidity rate, they are not guilty for the violence, they are not guilty for the wholesale contempt for the regulations. They are guilty of absolutely nothing. There was nothing because there is nothing. It is all us.
We stand and watch how they crowd into their tiny apartments, piling child upon child, families with 8 or 12 children in a two-and-a-half-room apartment in a damp basement floor in Bnei Brak, and we do not lift a finger. We see the horror and turn our gaze to the other side. Our helplessness is what brought these miserable people to where they are. What nerve we have. Instead of building them spacious detached-villa neighborhoods (12-14 rooms each, so every child can study properly), we keep packing them into Bnei Brak, Jerusalem, Beit Shemesh, Beitar, Modi’in Illit, and under every green tree. And afterward we still dare come with complaints against them!!
On one point he is right, Gafni. His unbelievable audacity, and that of his colleagues, is our fault. Only our fault. We raised this thing in our backyard, and now, when the wild growth covers the whole neighborhood, we are surprised. It should be emphasized: I am not speaking about the Haredim. I am speaking about their leadership. The Haredim in Israel have been drawing closer to Israeli society over the last decade at an accelerated pace. They are involved, they are interested, they are far more Zionist than they are willing to admit. Their tragedy (and ours) is the leadership. We will return to that.
The best illustration of the heights of absurdity being shattered here daily came this week, when the bill to increase fines against lockdown violators passed its first reading in the Knesset. Immediately afterward Gafni was “accidentally” filmed conducting a shouting conversation with a senior representative from the Prime Minister’s Office, threatening her in blunt language, demanding the fine increase be canceled immediately, and blurting out, as if by chance, that “this partnership is starting to disgust us.”
And lo and behold: two minutes later Prime Minister Netanyahu, the Haredim’s hostage until proven innocent, relents and tries to reach a “compromise proposal”—that the fines not be raised significantly, or that only a senior officer be able to impose them, that it be impossible to issue an administrative closure order against an educational institution operating during lockdown days.
That is how things have worked here for generations. That is how the mutation was created, in which an entire country became the hostage of a rapidly growing minority that keeps losing all balance and restraint on the way to the public purse. My hope and prayer is that Benny Gantz will break his usual pattern and not move a millimeter from his position yesterday: no extension of the lockdown, no cabinet meeting, and nothing at all—until the bill to increase fines passes without any compromise. Anyone who wants to extend the lockdown should first of all learn to enforce it on everyone. Secular people, Arabs, Haredim.
The Haredim are our brothers. Flesh of our flesh. Their tragedy is our tragedy. They live the life of this country, they know how to appreciate the country, they are involved in its life. Their silent majority knows that the current arrangement cannot continue forever. As they grow and their share of the population rises, it will become clear to them that the fragile balance on which this country rests needs adjustment. They will have to participate more in the labor market, study core subjects, and yes, also increase the rate of enlistment in the IDF. The Haredim know this truth. Their problem is the leadership, which keeps clinging with all its might to the 18th century.
They have their leadership; we have ours. Our leadership utterly nullifies itself before them for reasons every Israeli knows: Netanyahu needs the Haredim’s 16 fingers in the Knesset to continue his campaign to escape the fear of justice. In return, he pays from our pocket. In return, he mortgages governance, the law, order, the fight against the plague. It is customary to think that the Haredim are Netanyahu’s puppets and do as he commands. In reality, it is the opposite.
Dear MK Gafni, no, it is not our fault. I hope you do not believe your own nonsense. We did not instruct you to establish families of 12 children. In our world, families bring children into the world only when it is clear they have the means to raise them. We did not pack you into your neighborhoods. We did not force upon you a life of ignorance and poverty. We did not demand that you not give your children a modern education. We are not the ones keeping you in kollels and yeshivas until a late age. We did not teach you to place your trust in heavenly assistance as a permanent solution to the growing distress in your districts.
We, Mr. Gafni, do not have “heavenly assistance.” We have our work, our education, our responsibility, our sweat. The problem is that this so-called heavenly assistance often becomes a code word for the state treasury. And here too we are guilty. Your dependence on us keeps increasing, because of us. We pampered you all these years, accepted the culture of deprivation, cultivated the absurd idea of a “society of learners” growing at a tremendous rate, lacking any economic foundation whatsoever and relying on the state treasury and all kinds of charity funds. In the end, you are right, Gafni. The overall responsibility is ours, and we are the ones who need to pay the price. The truth is, we pretty much deserve it
Answer
It is entirely the Haredim’s fault. Every word of it.
Discussion on Answer
And it must also be added that if we are dealing with knowledge of the news, then here is a headline from today on Channel 12 News—
“Loneliness, learning difficulties, anxiety, and family problems: against the background of corona, the condition of Israel’s children is deteriorating.”
(It would be worth your looking at the body of the article in the domestic news section.)
And also an article from today titled, “Experts explain why the morbidity figures are not going down.”
And here is a quote from the body of the article: “The findings show that lockdowns kill. It is known that obesity, smoking, depression, unemployment, and loss of education are factors in illness and mortality for a great many diseases. They shorten lives.”
The experts who share Professor Levi’s view believe that a lockdown is a terrible mistake—not only because of the damage it leads to, but for the main reason that, according to them, it does not bring down infection rates. Most experts believe that the number of seriously ill patients in hospitals is not dropping despite the lockdown and the vaccinations—because of the British variant, but they are optimistic that this decline will come.
So if your claim was based on “people who have not mastered first-grade arithmetic, and whose decision-makers are at the level of understanding and thinking of a child in the lower grades of elementary school”—maybe you too should start keeping up with the news.
And after the amount of nonsense you wrote—I am really beginning to doubt your degree in physics, whether it is real and whether it is even yours at all.
Let us continue keeping up with the news—this time a headline from Kikar HaShabbat:
The coronavirus commissioner refrained from presenting the ministers with incorrect vaccination data regarding Haredi society.
Not once or twice. I have come across wording of answers here on the site, or statements, that were later corrected or explained. (Though even after the explanation one can still argue.)
I am not Gafni’s spokesman, and I also do not believe that this is what he meant—but I definitely understand the meaning of the words.
In recent years a situation has arisen in which construction projects were not advanced for the Haredi public (and also for the general public), demand rose relative to supply, and apartment prices skyrocketed. A Haredi person who wants to buy an apartment in a Torah-oriented place and at a reasonable price is forced to buy a tiny little apartment. And it is no secret that young Haredi couples get married at a rapid pace, and that creates the demand we are talking about.
So you do not have to be a great genius to understand the Haredim’s situation in crowded apartments. Is it really the seculars’ fault? On that, I certainly do not think Gafni meant Ben Caspit or anyone else, but rather the members of the legislature.
Besides, in one of the previous questions here on the site titled “Corona,” the following was mentioned: “When Haredi people have not mastered first-grade arithmetic, and their decision-makers are at the level of understanding and thinking of a child in the lower grades of elementary school, it is vital that they hear in the media about the concept of exponential spread, for example, or about various epidemiological processes.”
Well, if the chairman of the Finance Committee did not master first-grade arithmetic—I think Ben Caspit would have written about that earlier.
But what is clear is that Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky, who completed the entire Talmud, including tractate Eruvin or the laws of sanctifying the new month, which requires knowledge (deep or at least some) of the science of calculation—then really, as Gafni said, the claims are nonsense.
And despite that, obviously it is almost impossible to explain Rabbi Chaim’s opinion. And in any case, I am not his spokesman. But I am speaking about those who are sure that all wisdom is found only with them.
Why not at least try to think in the direction of: “Who says the lockdown is worth the spiritual, emotional, and economic price paid by the citizens?” Or for example: “Maybe in my situation I cannot step into the shoes of another citizen who lives differently and whose difficulty is different”? Are you updated on the condition of the students and teachers in the country? Do you know what they are going through? It is not smart to place only medicine and health on one side of the scales. We all know the considerations go beyond that.
But who better than you knows that the considerations in the government are certainly not pure. It is all a matter of scratch my back and I will scratch yours, political considerations and popularity considerations, inflated ego, and in short, “lack of fear of God.”
So what? You are against “anarchy”? Fine. But for that there is Torah. And in the Torah there is also an answer to such a situation.
And if in your view, according to the Torah one must listen only to the government and the experts—then there is a dispute here, and I do not necessarily see how it is connected to first-grade arithmetic.
So let us rephrase with a new sentence: “Every word of it? Nonsense, every word of it!!! And silence is twice as good!”