https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yosef_Eliyahu_Henkin
Henkin vigorously opposed Zionism, but once the State of Israel was established he declared the need to support its continued existence, and denounced those who tried to undermine it. In 1959 he wrote:
- I was shocked to read in Chomoteinu (Cheshvan 5719) the slanderous notion that we are required to give our lives to frustrate and resist the efforts of the State of Israel in its struggle against those who would rise up against them. This was stated as a psak din based on "Israel is restricted from rebelling against the nations." (Ketubot 111a) [...] but once done, though the admonition was ignored, we are required to support them with mesirut nefesh. [...] Once the state was declared, anyone who plays into the hands of the nations of the world even where there is no imminent danger, is clearly an informer and pursuer (rodef). All the more when there is danger to destruction of life in so doing. [...] Those essays I wrote before the advent of the state (many of which have been reprinted in my book Leiv Ivra) will testify to the fact that I am not a supporter of the government, and I objected to the entire idea of a state. (It is for this reason I am not a member of Agudah so that I not be judged incorrectly as one who agreed with their position in the founding of the state.) But now it is our obligation that we all support the state in the face of its external enemies and then go on to guide it in the ways of Torah.[8]
- https://web.archive.org/web/20050829193646/http://www.youngisrael.org/Divrei_Torah/Rabbi_s_Letter/#Rav%20Henkin%20ztz%E2%80%9Dl%20on%20Eretz%20Israel%20and%20Medinat%20Yisrael
-
Rav Henkin openly challenged the anti-Zionist position of Neturei Karta and the Satmar Rebbe, Rav Yoel Teitelbaum, ztz”l. He wrote (1959 / 5719):
I was shocked to read in Chomoteinu of Cheshvan 5719 the slanderous notion that we are required to give our lives (limsor nefesh) to frustrate and resist the efforts of the State of Israel in its struggle against those who would rise up against them. This was stated as a p'sak din based on what we learn that Israel is restricted from rebelling against the nations (Ketubot 111a).
This opinion is clearly not in keeping with halacha [and which can result] in imminent dangers for millions of Jews. True, Chazal admonished subsequent generations about such a rebellion because it would entail danger to Jewish life, but once done, though the admonition was ignored, we are required to support them with our mesirat nefesh.
In fact this is precisely what occurred before the destruction of the second Beit haMikdash when Chazal warned the populace not to revolt against the Romans. Even the king (sic.) of Israel did not favor a rebellion. However, once the rebellion broke out and the war endured, the Sages of Israel assisted the rebels in their war. This is as the Midrash states that Yaakov and his sons did not want to go to war against Shechem. Once the deed was done (by Shimon and Levi) he reasoned: Shall I allow my sons to fall into the hands of the enemy? And so, he took sword into hand and went against them.
Now all the rabbis who were opposed to Zionism and the establishment of a state took up that position until the time that it was officially founded. Once the state was declared, anyone who plays into the hands of the nations of the world even where there is no imminent danger, is clearly a moseir and rodeif. All the more when there is danger to destruction of life in so doing... Surely, those who recently emigrated must be very weary of the state's efforts to strip them of their Torah way of life, but to proclaim that anyone who aids the state is a rodeif, well such talk is the severest form of redifa.
Such a sin derives from yet another transgression that they pre-judge all Zionists, Mizrachi and Agudah members and their rabbis, as heretics and apikorsim...
I call upon all the sagacious leaders who identify with this position to repudiate this stand immediately because the Arabs and their cohorts are using this material to strengthen their propaganda against Israel…
I have already written elsewhere that with vulgar protests we will not succeed with the powers that be. Such tactics make things worse. What has to be done is to get into the government and the Knesset to internally save what can be saved and to strengthen Torah and its adherents.
Those essays I wrote before the advent of the state (many of which have been reprinted in my book Leiv Ivra) will testify to the fact that I am not a chassid of the government, I objected to the entire idea of a state. (It is for this reason I am not a member of Agudah so that I not be judged incorrectly as one who agreed with their position in the founding of the state.) But now it is our obligation that we all support the state in the face of its external enemies and then go on to guide it in the ways of Torah.
And for the one who hears such vilification as was published in Chomoteinu and does not protest it is nearly certain that he will be ensnared in the foul invective....
I wonder if this is why Rav Henkin, zt"l, was condemned to obscurity. The current position of the Agudah is that there is nothing special about the State, never has been, the Satmar was always right and the Gedolim have never been supportive. And here you have the Gadol HaDor saying "Look, we've got a State, support it!" Goes against the revisionist history line.
ReplyDeleteRav sz auerbach was enthusiastic about the State, and a follower of Rav kook, as was Rav eliashiv. I don't know how much they changed, but Rav elyashiv did take the full haredi line, but rsza even supported heter mechira.
ReplyDeleteRav Henkin ztl was not Chas v shalom condemned. He is not as well known as rav Moshe, but perhaps it's not important. It is well known that he was a great tzaddik and humble, perhaps he shunned the limelight.
ReplyDeleteBTW, rav Aharon ztl who may be associated with the hareidi agudah, was a multifaceted gadol. He was planning to give a hesped for rav Herzog ztl and faced opposition from extreme anti Zionists. His father in law, rav Meltzer was also very close to rav kook, and indeed rav Henkin.
Rav isser Zalman Meltzer 's talmid chacham muvhak, well in slutsk it was David rackman (father of Emanuel), in Israel was Shlomo Goren. Rav Aharon loved Goren and wanted him as his son in law!
Essentially, the entire spectrum of orthodoxy we discuss goes back to rav Meltzer ztl, and in a way, he is also forgotten.
You are misrepresenting his views1
ReplyDeleteIn the article you posted, you put the following paragraph in bold:
ReplyDeleteIn the end, Torah leaders
like Rav Yisrael Elchanan Spector from Kovno, Rav Yehoshua from Kutna,
Rav Avraham Kook (and in his footsteps, all the chief rabbis), the chief
rabbi of Yerushalayim, Rav Tzvi Pesach Frank, and Rav Shlomo Zalman
Auerbach (with a demand for improvements which have already been
implemented in the last few years) supported this approach.
So where is the misrepresentation? The demand for improvements, or that it is bedieved? Either way, he still supported it. BTW, in Rav Goren's book, after he left the chief Rabbinate, he calls for heter mechirah to end, since it was only meant to be temporary.
At state declaration he said some very positive religious things about the State. As did Rav elyashiv.
ReplyDeleteRA did not assume any clear-cut stance vis-à-vis the State of Israel; even so,
ReplyDeletehis Halakhic rulings suggest that he acknowledged the sovereignty of the state
and municipal authorities in Israel.6 He goes so far as to ascribe Halakhic status
to these sovereign institutions, even calling the government of Israel “Malkhut
Yisrael,” or Kingdom of Israel.7 This is not a mere emotional gesture or burst of
enthusiasm; it formally endows the regime in power with Halakhic authority.
For instance, as the Kingdom of Israel, the secular government of the State of
Israel is authorized to determine the borders of the Land of Israel, Eretz Yisrael,
with the several Halakhic implications that this has.8
Yet even recognizing the State does not necessarily entail embracing ag-
gressive military policy, considering especially that this approach is rejected
in traditional rabbinic texts. Nevertheless RA, the ultra-Orthodox Haredi rabbi
from Shaarei Chesed in Jerusalem, dealt, among other things, with issues relat-
ed to the military and laws of warfare. As has already been noted, Rabbi Isaac
Kofman, in his Ha-Tzava ka-Halakhah, chose RA as his Halakhic authority,9
relying on RA’s rulings based on an operational way of thinking. This refers
4 See Amir Mashiach, “From Past to Present—An analysis of the Various Sectors in Modern
Israel Based on Jewish Identities from Ancient Times,” in Social Issues in Israel 17 (2014),
pp. 38–68.
5 Ibid.
6 Amir Mashiach, “Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach’s Halakhic Rulings regarding the
Sovereignty of the State of Israel,” in Avinoam Rosnack, ed., Halakha: Explicit and Implied
Theoretical and Ideological Aspects (Jerusalem, 2012), pp. 115–132.
7 This answer was censored in the various editions of Minchat Shlomo. It appears full length in
Mashiach, Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach’s Halakhic Philosophy, pp. 241–244.
8 This finds its expression in the case in which RA was asked whether the city of Eilat should
observe the “Exiles’ Second Day of the Biblical Holidays” (Yom tov sheni shel galuyot). See RA,
Minchat Shlomo, part 2, 44.
9 Kofman, Ha-tzava ka-Halakhah
https://brill.com › article-p134_134
War and the Military in Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach's ... - Brill