The timing could not be worse; the 250th day of captivity, the 249th of war, over 100,000 people are displaced due to rocket fire in the north, tens of thousands are in reserves, leaving their jobs and families in the lurch, international pressure continues to intensify, and locally, though the colleges are on break, the antisemites have taken to protesting outside of the most non-political exhibition possible – the Nova festival exhibit in New York – all in the name of “anti-Zionism.”
At this precarious time, with so many external threats, the Israeli government looks like it is about to implode, leading to yet another election. The main reason behind the departure of Benny Gantz is what he describes as the lack of a plan for the future of Gaza. But the catalyst for him to leave, and the catalyst for Gallant, a coalition member of Netanyahu, who is now likely to leave as well, is the Charedi Draft Law.
Since the establishment of the State of Israel, men who dedicate their life to Torah study have been exempted from army service. Of course, back when Ben Gurion came to this agreement with the Chazon Ish, the Charedi community was a tiny fraction of its size. For much of the history of the State of Israel, having hundreds of thousands of Charedi soldiers would actually be a burden to the government. But today, with the Charedi community numbering at almost one and half million, today, with a war in the south and an almost inevitable war in the north, a lack of manpower is actually a very big deal.
What does our tradition have to say about Torah study and warfare? How do we balance the two? Physically protecting ourselves on the one hand and spiritually protecting ourselves on the other?
The very first person and the first generation who are instructed to study Torah day and night are none other than the first Jewish army and their general. Joshua, or Yehoshua, the leader and general of the first Jewish army, is instructed, “V’higisa bo yomam valaylah, you should immerse yourself in the Torah every day and every night.”
You would think that it would be Moshe, the first teacher of the Jewish People, the man who brings the Torah down to earth, who is instructed to study Torah day and night, but no, it is the warriors, the generals, the lieutenants, the privates, that are told to somehow find the time to ceaselessly study Torah. This is not a coincidence. War can be blinding; we can so easily lose ourselves in the desire for revenge. And so, it is specifically those who face the greatest risk of losing sight of their values that G-d instructs to engage in His Torah.
There is a practice among soldiers of the IDF to write a letter to their family in case they do not come home. It’s an opportunity to share with one’s family, of course, but it serves a second purpose, very much aligned with what we just said. It gives the soldiers an opportunity to clarify for themselves why they are going into battle.
Allow me to read a note written by Yaron Eliezer, a 23-year-old Givati soldier from Ranana, to his family.
“To my precious and beloved family, who is supposed to teach children of [just] 23 years old to write letters like this?
What a unique country we live in! I feel privileged to take part in the protection of this country. I feel like I am a part of the history being written here.
Thank you for educating me to sanctify G-d’s name, to do kindness, to love the land.
All of this is in your merit and for you!
I love you so much. Am Yisrael Chai!”
Yaron was killed in battle on December 27th.
This young man, who barely started his life, knew what he was fighting for. Throughout so much of our history, when our enemies attacked, we hid our Jewish identity. But Yaron and so many like him, are not running from their Jewish identity, they are embracing it. Through his Torah education he knew what the land of Israel represents. Through his Torah education he lived for values greater than himself, willing to give his life to the Jewish People and to G-d.
We have a lot to learn from them. We may not be gearing up for battle, but we are all under assault, and it’s so easy to lose sight of anything beyond survival. It’s so easy to just make this a fight between those who want to kill us and our mere survival. But it’s more than survival. V’higisa bo yomam valaylah, the commandment to learn Torah was given in the midst of a battle for our existence. Like Yaron, we need to engage with our history, we need to deepen our connection to our tradition, in the midst of war, a war which we are all waging, we need Torah study today more than ever.
In the fifth chapter of the Book of Yehoshua, we find Yehoshua walking by himself at night, and he is confronted by an angel. The angel has his sword drawn, indicating to Yehoshua that something is wrong. The Talmud’s interpretation of this interaction (Megilah, 3a) is that the angel was conveying to Yehoshua G-d’s displeasure with the soldiers being asleep. Now the reason they were asleep was because the next day they were going into battle. But nonetheless, the angel told him, they should have been spending the night… you guessed it, studying Torah. It is not enough to write a note to one’s family clarifying our purpose. It’s not enough to have a Torah class. The Biblical model of balancing Torah study and warfare is to not balance it at all. The soldiers of the original IDF were expected to not sleep, but to study, and to somehow find the strength to then wage war.
Now obviously this is not a very practical model. We cannot, in 2024, have an army that does not sleep. The precision, the alertness, the training needed to run missions like the one they ran this past Shabbos, sleeplessness is not an option. And so, the State of Israel is faced with a dilemma; we need soldiers fighting our wars, and we also need students studying our Torah. We need generals and we need Torah giants. We cannot rely on miracles, and we cannot rely on our own strength either.
I was discussing this dilemma with my father. My father’s father fought in the War of Independence. My father served in the IDF, and his brother fought in the IDF and was killed in battle. Needless to say, he has strong opinions about this topic. But you know what he told me? He said, “Sruli, this doesn’t impact you in any way. You’re not voting, your children are not being drafted. No one in Israel cares about your opinion. It’s not relevant to you.” And he’s right. But let me tell you what is relevant to each of us. In Israel they have to choose between these two incredibly important values. In Israel they have to pick one over the other. But we, though we are undoubtedly busy, are also not running secret ops in middle of Rafah. We are not fighting at the border of Lebanon. We are not waging war and so we only have one option available to us. What’s our excuse to not immerse ourselves in Torah study?
Our brothers and sisters in Israel, they need us.
***
Gilad Nechemia Nitzan, 21, from Shiloh, wrote the following message before he went into his final battle:
“Thank you, G-d, for the path you sent me on.
I will not stop at this point; I will continue forward with all my strength!
The ultimate purpose is to be a true servant of G-d. And it is a very long and increasingly difficult path that gets progressively harder. But I have power and faith to persevere and advance in my personal growth in order to make a good impact and to lift people up. And at the end we will be successful.”
Gilad and his friends are giving it and gave it their all; we need to do the same.
Shavuot is a time that we celebrate the giving of the Torah. It has been a complicated relationship from day one. The Talmud wryly observes the connection between the name Sinai and Sinah – hatred. From the day we became a nation, we have been hated.
But in addition to the hate, we are living in an incredible time in history. Today, this ancient hate is not causing us to flee, it is causing us to double down. Like Yaron, like Gilad, like so many young men and women who went into battle with their heads up high. We are holding our heads high because we stand for something. Many of you, over the past weeks studied chapters of Tanach, of our Torah, in memory of a soldier, Michael Eliyahu, a proud policeman who knew exactly what he was fighting for. We deepened our connection to the stories of our past, to the prophecies that describe not just the future, but the present; we deepened our connection to our values. This is exactly how a Jew wages war.
***
I imagine a scene up in Heaven where our loved ones are greeting these holy soldiers, lining up to shake their hands, to say thank you. And these holy soldiers do what every self-respecting Jew does, they play Jewish geography. And these soldiers say, “I know you!”
Me? How do you know me?
“Your child, your spouse, your parent, they are learning Torah for me. They were partnering with me when I went into battle.” “They are learning in my memory because I cannot learn anymore.”
***
May we not be intimated by our enemies and may we hold our head up high. May we not lose sight of our purpose and may we continue to engage in G-d’s Torah. Let the Israelis argue over who should enlist in the IDF and who should learn Torah. But in America, there is no question. May we do our part in waging this war, and in that merit, may all of our brothers and sisters come home in safety.