Chessed? You mean Cruelty.
What do charedi yeshiva students represent?
I couldn’t believe my ears.
There is a newly-released video of Rav Moshe Hillel Hirsch, one of the leaders of the Lithuanian charedi word, in which he declares that it is a mitzvah to refuse to report to a draft order.
That’s not the part that I couldn’t believe. After all, it’s become clear since Oct. 7 that charedi society’s idea of mitzvos is the opposite of the actual mitzvos.
Rav Hirsch then talks about how the entire existence of Israel is dependent on Torah, by which he means specifically the Torah of all hundred thousand (and growing) charedim aged 18-24; were there only to be Torah learned by half that number, or by people older or younger or dati-leumi, it would be insufficient to enable the country to exist.
That’s also not the part that I couldn’t believe. After all, even though Israel existed for decades, through the challenges of ‘48 and the 50s and ‘67, without a hundred thousand charedim in yeshiva, charedim habitually refuse to confront history.
The part that I couldn’t believe was when he said that it’s not just about the Torah of charedi yeshiva students, but also about the chessed that they do.
You’ve got to be kidding.
I spent many years in several charedi yeshivos. And chessed was absolutely not on the curriculum. Chessed was for girls. Chessed was bittul Torah, to be done by guys with too much adrenaline who aren’t cut out for the higher goal of learning Torah. The extent of chessed done in charedi yeshivos is putting a sefer back on the shelf.
And aside from that - as Rav Aharon Lichtenstein writes, the fundamental reason for being in the army is not milchemes mitzvah, it’s that chessed is one of the pillars of Judaism, and there is no greater and more essential chessed than protecting the lives of your people.
In the past year, the charedi community has spectacularly failed to engage in the chessed of army service. Rav Dov Landau even condemned the idea of doing chessed for soldiers and their families. And by not engaging in chessed, they have expressed the most appalling achzariyus, cruelty.
Many of the reservists are not young men - they are married men, fathers, in their late twenties or thirties or forties. Endless tens of thousands of families have suffered due to the husband/ father/ son being away for months on end from their wives and children and siblings, from their jobs, compromising their emotional and physical health and sometimes their very lives. They are absolutely desperate to be able to return to their lives and try to rebuild them. But they cannot, because there is nobody to replace them. Because the tens of thousands of young charedi men are too busy with Torah and chessed.
The Torah tells us twelve times to be sensitive to widows and orphans. It’s actually a mitzvah. As Rav Granot said, the charedi refusal to draft their young men has not just created many literal widows and orphans; it has also turned hundreds of thousands of people into effectively being widows and orphans, with the husband/ father being away for so long. It’s absolutely heart-wrenching, and entirely avoidable. But for charedim, says Rav Hirsch, it’s a mitzvah!
This is what we should be saying to charedim who demand to be exempt from army service. Forget about all your halachic and hashkafic contrivances and claims that the army cannot accommodate your special sensitivities. What about the terrible hardship and suffering that the charedi community is causing for the reservists and their families?
As I’ve noted previously, the Gemara says that there are three hallmarks of the Jewish People: they are rachmanim (merciful), bayshanim (shame-faced), and gomlei chasadim (performers of kindness). The charedi community is shirking the chessed that is needed in this crucial hour, they are showing no rachmanus, and they have no shame about it. They have seceded from the Jewish People.
A full list of my posts on the topic of IDF service is at Torah and Army: The Big Index
As the mother of a reservist who has seen way too much duty I worry very much about the consequences of this continuing war. Your writing speaks volumes about the lack of compassion, self centered and entitlement fostered in some parts of the Ultra Orthodox community. Many Israelis both study and learn, to their individual capacities as well as serving to protect our country and contributing to the general welfare instead of exploiting the benefits of living in Israel. They are causing so much harm to our unity and security that their very existence has become a burden rather than the blessing it was meant to be.
When I was in graduate school, I suddenly had an itch to learn more Torah as well. I thought I would try learning a chapter of mishnah a day. At first, I chose a מסכת with short chapters. But, it became an obsession, even when the chapters were longer and more difficult, and as a result, my grades suffered.
I asked the campus rabbi, Rabbi Joseph Polak שליט"א. He said that the Ba'al HaTanya wrote that, at times, a person's yetzer hara can convince him to learn Torah, and it will be at the expense of other mitzvos that are incumbent on him (the Ba'al HaTanya gave the example of not devoting enough time to tefillah, but it can be extended to other things as well). Rabbi Polak told me that learning Torah is wonderful, but it can't be at the expense of my graduate studies (there was also an economic aspect to it, since the university gives a scholarship to their graduate students).
I think the same can be applied here: Learning Torah is a lofty pursuit, perhaps even the loftiest of all types of avodas Hashem, during times of peace. But, when the Jewish people are attacked from so many directions, it should be clear that Hashem is requesting another type of avodah at this juncture in time.