What Rashi would surely say about today’s draft-dodging Haredim (Parshat Matot)
The Haredi refusal to take part in the defense of Israel is an obscenity. But the real obscenity is not the preference to remain in the safety of their air-conditioned yeshivas – assuming they are even sitting in yeshivas. Nor is it the spurious claim some of them make that their Torah learning plays a role in securing our nation. Nor is it even their hooliganism and violence as they paralyze our roads and vandalize our public transportation system while trumpeting their “refusal to serve in the enemy army”.
All of these are indeed reprehensible, yet they are merely symptomatic of a far deeper and more objectionable root problem. Because what is truly offensive is their utter negation of any Torah that is disconnected from their way of life. Such Torah does not exist. The hundreds of Religious Zionist yeshivot are simply not on their radar. The monumental Torah scholars who abound in the ‘Dati Leumi’ (Religious Zionist) community are irrelevant, as is any of their brilliant scholarship and significant published oeuvre. Haredi rejection is total. Any Torah that does not wear a black Borsalino or shtreimel and answer to the diktats of a 90 year old hater of Zionism does not exist.
Yet even this is hardly the worst aspect of this abomination. Indeed, the most inexcusable and unforgivable part of this scenario is that our cynical and self-serving Government pays lip service (and billions of shekels) to this obscenity. And it is about to sanction this ethos through pending legislation that would effectively enshrine this haredi travesty in basic law.
The fact is, Torah can be found everywhere in the IDF. Thrice daily minyans can be found everywhere in the IDF. Strict Shabbat observance can be found everywhere in the IDF. Most significantly, some 60% of soldiers who lose their lives in battle are religious. And yet they represent only 15% of the population.
It is this tragic fact that we need to focus on.
If religious casualties would be proportionate among fallen IDF heroes, the fact of their religiosity would be irrelevant. Yes, each one would be a tragedy, but no different from their non-observant comrades among whom they rest in our military cemeteries.
However, when the casualty rate is so totally out of proportion to their numbers, then clearly the fact of their religiosity must be playing a significant role in their sacrifice. And that factor is precisely Torah, and precisely their adherence to the Torah’s requirement to defend the country. Because the Torah’s definition of an איש (a man) is יוצא צבא, someone who is, or has been, active in the military.
Clearly, haredi Torah and religious Zionist Torah are mutually exclusive. Haredi Torah is insular, rejectionist, disinterested in anyone but itself, willfully disloyal to the greater society, and ready to twist and distort the Torah’s words in order to support a self-serving agenda.
The opposite is true about religious Zionists who study Torah no less diligently yet for whom Torah’s supreme value is the defense of the Land and the People of Israel.
Who would Rashi side with? Let’s ask him:
וַיְדַבֵּ֤ר מֹשֶׁה֙ אֶל־הָעָ֣ם לֵאמֹ֔ר הֵחָלְצ֧וּ מֵאִתְּכֶ֛ם אֲנָשִׁ֖ים לַצָּבָ֑א וְיִהְיוּ֙ עַל־מִדְיָ֔ן לָתֵ֥ת נִקְמַת־יְהֹוָ֖ה בְּמִדְיָֽן
Moshe spoke to the people, saying, “Let troops be picked out from among you for a campaign, and let them fall upon Midian to wreak God’s vengeance on Midian.
Bamidbar/Numbers 31:3
In this week’s Torah reading, Parshat Matot, Moshe calls for an army of 1,000 hand-picked fighters from each tribe for a war to vanquish Midian. These warriors would be the creme de la crème of those 600,000 Israelites who met the criteria of מבן עשרים ומעלה יוצא צבא – being over 20 and part the military. Anyone not meeting these criteria was not included in the count of the 600,000 Israelites.
Rashi, the definitive Tlorah commentator, clarified the verse cited above and tells us EXACTLY who these hand-picked soldiers were:
Says Rashi:
החלצו. כְּתַרְגּוּמוֹ, לְשׁוֹן חֲלוּצֵי צָבָא — מְזֻיָּנִים
החלצו — armed for war
אנשים. צַדִּיקִים, וְכֵן “בְּחַר לָנוּ אֲנָשִׁים” (שמות י”ז), וְכֵן “אֲנָשִׁים חֲכָמִים וִידֻעִים” (דברים)
אנשים Men — righteous men…men wise and respected
נקמת ה’. שֶׁהָעוֹמֵד כְּנֶגֶד יִשְׂרָאֵל כְּאִלּוּ עוֹמֵד כְּנֶגֶד הַקָּבָּ”ה
’נקמת ה – because whoever attacks Israel is as though he attacks the Holy One blessed be He.
Who today fits this description of warriors qualified to vanquish those who attack Israel? The haredim drinking coffee and smoking Marlboros in their air-conditioned kollels, or the Torah heroes wearing kippot srugot (knitted kippot) who so readily and disproportionately sacrifice their lives so that we can survive and thrive?
The question is rhetorical. After all, Rashi actually worked for a living, interacted with real people, and could never imagine a society which eschewed honest labor or, in Israel, military service. In this he was no different from virtually every Torah sage until the 20th Century when a new post-WW2 religion was invented which mandated a life of full-time learning, lifelong male unemployment, rejecting participation in any aspect of making life livable. And, of course, those who do not buy into this ethos would be responsible for their food, clothing, shelter, medical care, electricity, water, highways etc – with never so much as a thank you.
It is time to call a spade a spade. Haredi Judaism is a recent invention and a heresy. It should be treated as such. Unfortunately, drafting haredim is a non-starter. But to support them turns all of us into enablers, like providing alcohol to alcoholics and heroin to addicts. The only difference is that alcoholics and addicts do not reproduce in record numbers, if at all. They are a nuisance but not a threat, except to themselves. By contrast, haredim are fraying the very fabric of our society. The time has come for us to stop feeding their habit. Hopefully the upcoming election will accomplish this,
