开云体育

Single Messages Topics Expanded Polls

article

Eli Shulman #12 开云体育 The Jerusalem Post 1/18/01 ? ????? THINK AGAIN: The Orthodox connection ????? By Jonathan Rosenblum ? ????? (January 18) A rather unusual solidarity mission arrived in Jerusalem this ????? week. The 160-member mission, sponsored by Agudath Israel of America, ????? arrived without fanfare or advance publicity. Even the hotel in which the ????? visitors were staying did not note their presence. They did not show the ????? flag around the country or even visit nearby Gilo. ? ????? The only thing that the group did was study Talmud in the Renaissance ????? Hotel for three days. ? ????? Each day began at 6:30 a.m. with the study of the daily folio of Talmud ????? and ended at 10 p.m. ? ????? Though a number of the participants have rabbinic ordination, none of them ????? earn their livings as rabbis. They are businessmen and professionals and ????? their participation in the three-day yarchei kalla (religious retreat) ????? entailed taking a full week off from business. ? ????? What did they come for if not to be updated on the security situation? Why ????? did they have to travel 9,600 km to sit and learn Torah? ? ????? The mission was above all a deep expression of the participants' faith ????? that the world ultimately runs, not according to inviolable laws of nature ????? and ineluctablec laws of history, but according to the will of God. ????? Nowhere is that so true as in the Land of Israel, which the Torah ????? describes as that land "upon which God's eyes rest from the beginning of ????? year until the end of the year." ? ????? The Torah contrasts the Land of Israel to Egypt. The latter draws its ????? water from the Nile, while the inhabitants of the Land are completely ????? dependent on rainfall. That dependence reminds us constantly of our ????? reliance on God. ? ????? Torah learning, says the Talmud, "protects and saves." And there is no ????? Torah learning like that of Eretz Yisrael. Its very air is said to make ????? wise those who pursue knowledge. By coming now, the participants in the ????? mission affirmed their belief that nothing they could do would have such a ????? profound effect on the situation of their fellow Jews as learning Torah in ????? the Land of Israel. ? ????? THE PARTICIPANTS in the yarchei kalla were able to forgo the usual ????? solidarity mission itinerary precisely because their bonds to Israel are ????? so strong. They had no need to publicly manifest their identification with ????? the plight of Israel's Jews by coming now; they and their children never ????? stop coming. ? ????? Nearly everyone on the mission is a frequent visitor. Almost without ????? exception, they have children currently studying or who have studied in ????? Israel, and many have children and grandchildren living here. ? ????? A few years of study in the great yeshivot of Israel is today de rigeuer ????? for American yeshiva students. The Mirrer Yeshiva alone has 1,000 ????? unmarried foreign students and at least an equal number of married ones. ? ????? Well over 5,000 unmarried young Orthodox men and women are presently ????? studying in Israel. And there are at least an equal number of young ????? marrieds living here. Many of them will settle here permanently. ? ????? During the worst days of the current intifada fewer than 10% percent of ????? those students returned home, and all but a few come back immediately ????? after Succot. At a time when El Al was canceling flights to Israel right ????? and left, it had to add flights on October 28 and 29 to accommodate all ????? the returning yeshiva students. ? ????? Even Tuvia Grossman, the yeshiva student pictured on the front page of The ????? New York Times bleeding profusely after having been stabbed and having his ????? head cracked open with a rock by a group of Palestinian teenagers who ????? dragged him and his two friends from a cab on the way to the Kotel, ????? returned as soon as he completed physical therapy. ? ????? The thousands of Orthodox parents who left their children in Israel, ????? despite the horrifying pictures and State Department advisories, did so ????? not because they are unconcerned about their children's safety, but ????? because they are convinced that the benefits of study and living in Israel ????? far outweigh any dangers. ? ????? THE INTENSE Orthodox connection to Israel begins in early childhood. Every ????? Orthodox child, from a very early age spends much of his emotional, ????? imaginative life in Eretz Yisrael. At six or seven, he or she first ????? encounters the Land in God's injunction to Abraham to leave his father's ????? house and travel to "a Land that I will show you." From that moment on, ????? the Land of Israel is an ideal. It is always before us, slightly beyond ????? our grasp - "the Land I will show you." ? ????? Only 270 of the 613 mitzvot the Orthodox child studies can be performed ????? without the Land and our Temple. ? ????? When the Orthodox child studies the Binding of Isaac, he first encounters ????? Jerusalem and the Temple Mount: "And Avraham called the name of that site, ????? Hashem yireh, as it is said this day, on the mountain Hashem [God] will be ????? seen." On that mountain, Jews gathered three times a year to see and be ????? seen. There they perceived (yeru) the Divine Presence in its wholeness ????? (shalem). Jerusalem, or its synonym, Zion, is mentioned 738 times in the ????? Tanach. ? ????? Nor is the connection limited to the ideal Land described in the Torah. I ????? am frequently embarrassed to receive calls from friends in the States and ????? in England asking about events about which I have not yet heard. They seem ????? to keep a radio tuned to Israeli stations by their desk or to be updated ????? from the Internet every half hour. ? ????? Whatever Orthodox shul one prays in abroad, the prayers inevitably ????? conclude with the recitation of Psalms on Israel's behalf, and then ????? conversation turns immediately to the "situation." ? ????? American Orthodox Jews constitute the strongest supporters of Israel. The ????? late political scientist Daniel Elazar noted several years ago that the ????? affiliated American Jewish community is approximately equally divided ????? between Reform, Conservative and Orthodox Jews. Of those affiliated Jews, ????? the Orthodox are by far the most likely to visit Israel, to make aliya or ????? to speak Hebrew. And as historian Lucy Dawidowicz lamented more than a ????? decade ago, the Orthodox are virtually the only Jews who vote primarily ????? based upon their perception of Jewish interests, chief among them the ????? security of Israel's Jews. ? ????? This week's Agudath Israel mission did not come to make any political ????? statement, but its presence nevertheless makes a point that Israeli ????? policymakers would do well to heed.

#12

Join [email protected] to automatically receive all group messages.