Little Children

Rabbinic "Greats" who refuse to think about responsibility

Well, that’s unfortunate. The government isn’t falling, after all. Yuli Edelstein managed to stand up to the Kremlin, but he couldn’t stand up to Bibi and the charedim. In addition, the charedim realized that what they have going now is much better than the alternative, since at least Bibi will work to get them as much money as possible and as few restrictions as possible. And naturally all the politicians from Likud and so-called “Religious Zionism” (which happily aligns with anti-Zionists) and “Otzma Yehudit” (which happily aligns with those seeking to weaken the IDF) were happy to play along. And so a weakened version of the Evasion Law has been worked out, which will assuredly not result in any significant number of charedim enlisting. The appalling burden on the soldiers and the reservists will continue to grow, as it has been doing for nearly two years.

Meanwhile, in the letter prohibiting all charedim from drafting, there are some significant observations to be made. One of the reasons given was that the army is subject to secular law. Although Satmar and Ponovezh have gone to secular courts, it is considered beyond the pale for soldiers to be subject to it. But note that prohibiting army service for this reason would not only apply to charedim - it would apply to all religious Jews.

Then one signatory, Rabbi Yechiel Michel Zilber, rosh yeshiva of Zvil (where I used to learn), added a note of particular interest. Quoting the Tshebiner Rav, he wrote that since King David only went to war after consulting the Sanhedrin and the Urim V’Tumim, we cannot send anyone at all to war in the absence of those, no matter who they are.

In other words, this is beyond even charedim who are not in yeshiva, beyond even religious Jews who are not charedi. He is saying that nobody at all should go to battle.

A friend of mine asked me what exactly, according to R. Zilber, are the Jews of Israel supposed to do in order to defend themselves? When hordes of terrorists pour into Kiryat Sefer and Beitar, are the charedim going to shout that there’s no Urim V’Tumim and therefore there can’t be a war?

The answer is that of course R. Zilber, just like all the charedim, wants there to be an army, no matter what they profess to believe. And they want it to be a powerful army that will protect them. They most certainly want Dati hesder boys to serve in the army, notwithstanding it being subject to secular courts. (That’s why when I publicly confronted R. Mordechai Neugroschel about this, he refused to say that hesder boys should also stay in yeshiva, even though he had previously claimed that being in yeshivah is more important.)

And so what’s the explanation for statements like the one made by R. Zilber, that nobody can go to battle? The answer is that they are simply uttered without any serious thought as to their implications. Because the “Gedolim” never give serious thought to serious matters at all.

It’s not just national defense - it’s also the economy. You don’t need to be a genius to realize that when you have a sector of the population that is (A) massively underemployed (both in terms of the number of people employed, and the types of jobs held by those who are employed), (B) receiving enormous amounts in welfare, and (C) rapidly growing in size, then this spells disaster not only for that sector, but for the entire country. So what do the Gedolim say about this? Nothing at all - they don’t even think about it. There’s nobody of stature in the charedi world discussing long-term planning, no interest in surveys and statistics and economic models, no discussions in the charedi press. Ask anyone in the charedi world what the Gedolim’s plan is for charedi society, for Israel. Nobody can tell you.

The wonderful Rabbi Yehoshua Pfeffer, in an article presented at the end of this post, pointed out that Yaakov Litzman, an MK from Agudas Yisrael, was repeatedly asked on the radio what the charedim would do about army service if and when they become the majority of Israel. Litzman constantly refused to answer, insisting that it will never happen, that it is impossible, that they will always be the minority.

Why did he refuse to answer? Because being in the majority requires taking responsibility. (So does being a large minority, but they can get away with ignoring that and taking advantage of everyone else.) And the charedi way of life is absolutely incompatible with taking responsibility. Therefore, they will not even discuss it, not even theoretically.

As Rav Eliezer Melamed has said, these people are not Gedolim. Greatness necessitates an all-embracing, fully accountable handling of serious issues facing the
generation. These people are the very furthest thing from that, not even remotely addressing the most blindingly obvious and serious of problems (and not caring about the suffering that they cause to others). They are not Gedolim - they are Ketanim, little children with no maturity and no sense of responsibility.