We must end the Torah diaspora before the Torah disapora ends us (Devarim)
הוֹאִ֣יל מֹשֶׁ֔ה בֵּאֵ֛ר אֶת־הַתּוֹרָ֥ה הַזֹּ֖את לֵאמֹֽר׃
רַב־לָכֶ֥ם שֶׁ֖בֶת בָּהָ֥ר הַזֶּֽה
בֹּ֚אוּ וּרְשׁ֣וּ אֶת־הָאָ֔רֶץ אֲשֶׁ֣ר נִשְׁבַּ֣ע יְ֠הֹוָ֠ה לַאֲבֹ֨תֵיכֶ֜ם
נָתַ֨ן יְהֹוָ֧ה אֱלֹהֶ֛יךָ לְפָנֶ֖יךָ אֶת־הָאָ֑רֶץ עֲלֵ֣ה רֵ֗שׁ׃
Moshe undertook to expound this Torah, saying;
You have stayed long enough at this mountain (Horeb/Sinai)
Go and inherit the land that יהוה swore to your fathers
God יהוה has placed the land at your disposal. Go up, take possession,
(Devarim/Number 1: 5,6,8,21)
The above is an abridged distillation of the essential words of the opening chapter of Devarim/Numbers. I have done this not, Heaven forfend, because any word in Torah is superfluous, but simply to clarify things for the 138,671 (last counted in 2021) young men who are physically in Israel but mentally still entrapped in the Horebs called Mir, Slabodka, Ponovezh, Brisk, Telshe and the myriad other lost yeshivot of Eastern and Central Europe.
In Devarim 1, Torah is concerned that the Israelites, after receiving the Law at Sinai, were quite content to remain there. They had no motivation to conquer and cultivate the Land of Israel. Just as they had expressed a nostalgia for the fleshpots of the Egyptian exile, they now seemed to prefer the easy living of exile at the base of Mt. Sinai where, the Sages imagine, the Children of Israel were steeped in the study of Torah
Today’s Israel-dwelling but diaspora-nostalgic haredi Torah society is not, however, trapped in a genuine memory of pre-Shoah European religious life. Rather, their fantasy is a myth about what those pre-Holocaust shtetls were like. Because, in truth, the idea of universal, full-time Torah study not only flies in the face of Torah itself (Six days you shall work …) but it flies in the face of the pre-war reality.
The overwhelming majority of God-fearing pre-war Jews were hardly engaged in full time learning. And the very few who were sitting in the Beit Midrash tended to be boys from wealthy homes and/or gifted fellows using the yeshiva as a highway to marrying rich girls so that they could then enjoy a few more years of Torah vacation before marching like princelings into a father in law’s business.
There are overwhelming references from Torah, Talmud and later sages, like Rambam/Maimonides – not to mention the actual vocations of both Talmudic sages and their scholarly descendants – that earning a livelihood in the real world is not optional. It is mandatory.
Yes, one should ideally set aside regular times for Torah learning, but one MUST first go out and earn an honest living.
Maimonides was adamant, going so far as to declare that learning for a living inevitably leads to the robbing of others. His precise and prophetic words in Hilkhot Talmud Torah 3:3 regarding one who earns their livelihood from Torah study is סופו שהוא מלסטם את הבריות, eventually he will rob the public.
I just came across a curious borrowing of Rambam’s precise words in a contemporary explanation ( ותן חלקנו, a popular daily Torah compendium) of the justification for the execution by stoning of the בן סורר ומורה the rebellious son (Devarim/Deuteronomy 21:18). Using Rambam’s precise phrasing, סופו שהוא מלסטם את הבריות, this commentator explains that we execute the rebellious son not for what he has done — as yet, this adolescent only shows symptoms of evil. Rather he is condemned by the court for what he will inevitably end up doing, i.e. robbing the public.
Hence, by the same logic one can infer that a בן תורה, a full-time Torah scholar, like the delinquent בן סורר ומורה , should have his criminal career nipped in the bud as well, before he ends up spending his life embezzling from the public. And while I would hardly countenance stoning, perhaps less draconian, but still drastic, measures should be taken..
Rambam’s words were prophetic. The grand larceny that is today’ so-called Torah world is a disgrace, especially here in Israel where the theft is augmented by willfully ignoring Moshe’s exhortation in the opening chapter of Devarim, רַב־לָכֶ֥ם שֶׁ֖בֶת בָּהָ֥ר הַזֶּֽה. But at least in Moshe’s time the Israelites were stuck in a real Horeb out of inertia. They had not transplanted an imaginary diaspora ethos to the Promised Land. By contrast, today’s Torah community has imported the galut lock stock and barrel; from dress, to language, to pronunciation, to a reflexive rationalizing of sponging off the productivity and defense sacrifices of others.
This crime is compounded, as it also leads politicians (who are hardly known for their integrity) to intensify their nefarious ways by cynically paying lip service to a myth of full-time Torah learning in order to purchase the legislative rubber-stamp of haredi parties. And the price they pay at our collective expense – in both coin and limb – is one that productive citizens can no longer afford.
Zev Jabotinsky was reputed to have said; “End the diaspora before the diaspora ends you.” His words were more prophetic than even he knew. If we fail to terminate the exponentially growing diaspora in our midst, this domestic galut will eventually terminate all of us. Indeed, we must end the Torah galut before the Torah galut ends us.