Q&A: The Claim That the Torah Protects the Jewish People
The Claim That the Torah Protects the Jewish People
Question
Lately we’ve been hearing more and more the statement that the Torah is what protects the Jewish people, and therefore yeshiva students must not be drafted. And I ask: how can it be that on the holiday of the Torah itself—namely Simchat Torah—the terrible massacre of October 7 happened? Surely that is actually proof of the opposite of what they are saying.
Like the statement said by Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, “It is good to rely on Rabbi Shimon in a time of pressing need,” and in the end, on his festival of Lag BaOmer, 45 Jews died because of crowding when they came to his gravesite.
Does the Rabbi have an explanation for this?
Answer
You’ll have to ask that of whoever makes that claim. But I can guess what answer you’d get: that it protected us so that something even more terrible would not happen. Alternatively, there were other causes of the disaster that even the Torah was not enough to save us from.
Your claim about Rabbi Shimon is simply bizarre. You do not understand at all the meaning of the saying you quoted. “In a time of pressing need” does not mean when there is physical crowding of people. It means that when you are in distress, there is room to be lenient in Jewish law in accordance with the opinion of Rabbi Shimon. Forgive me, but if you want to discuss something, you first need to acquire a minimal understanding of the material.
But there is no point continuing to discuss claims that I do not accept. You need to discuss it with the person making them.
Discussion on Answer
In my opinion, the Torah does not protect, because the Torah does not do anything. The Torah is a book. The Holy One, blessed be He, is supposed to protect. But in my view He is usually not involved, and therefore usually does not protect either. Also, nobody can know what protects and what does not, so statements in this area seem baseless to me.
But clearly the survival of the Jewish people depends on the Torah—not because it protects, or because the Holy One, blessed be He, protects, but because this is the culture we carry. A shared culture and shared values preserve a group.
No—the meaning is definitely not that he protects and guards, but that he is a Torah scholar, and therefore one who relies on him, even if the Jewish law does not follow his opinion, is not making too great a mistake.
Thank you very much to the Rabbi for the answers; they are enlightening and give real clarity and understanding of these things.
If anything, the question from Simchat Torah proves the opposite: nothing happened to the synagogues and communities that keep the Sabbath, and only at the party and in other places that do not keep the Sabbath and have nothing to do with Simchat Torah. Maybe that shows that the Torah took revenge on those who do not study it and do not rejoice in its celebration, as someone said: “On Simchat Torah nothing happened; on the seventh of October it happened.”
Yoni, you’re also wrong on the facts.
Religious people, and even Haredim, were also killed on Simchat Torah—truly righteous people too.
Of course, religious kibbutzim were also attacked and people were killed there, and in Ofakim as well.
And more.
In short, just nonsense and bluff.
In your opinion, the Torah does not protect and defend the Jewish people?
Or does it mean that if people keep the Torah, then it itself is preserved, because it is passed from generation to generation, but there is no protection in the actual study of it?
And regarding Rabbi Shimon, it’s clear to me that the “pressing need” he mentioned is not physical crowding of people, like what happened in the disaster, but rather a time of uncertainty. And what I meant was that he protects and guards, and here, on his day, he did not manage to protect the people who came to him, and his merit did not stand by them for protection and rescue.