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Rabbi Elisha Aviner - Education Corner Open Letter to Our Youth: “To Enlist of Not to Enlist”

Recently a petition has been circulating that calls upon youth to forego their army service. This was to be expected. Time after time, our country’s leadership has been warned that their policy is causing a rift in the nation. The heads of the army have been warned that enlisting the army in uprooting Jews from parts of Eretz Yisrael and their massive involvement in the expulsion would lead to profound estrangement from the army. For many, the army is no longer perceived as a people’s army. It has lost its luster. Hence, it is no surprise that young people are speaking negatively about the army and are embarrassed to wear its uniform. The main question is this: Does the present crisis of confidence regarding the army justify not enlisting in it? Is this a proper step? Is it an appropriate response? This grave episode warrants examination from various angles:

1. Israeli army service is a mitzvah. We do not enlist in the army because we support the political steps being taken by the prime minister or his defense minister. We do not enlist because of our enormous admiration for the head of the army or one of the generals in his staff. Rather, we enlist because it is a mitzvah. Enlisting is not a political step that expresses faith in the government or the Knesset. Rather, it is a mitzvah. What mitzvah is it?

First of all, it is a mitzvah to take part in Israel’s compulsory wars defending Israel from its enemies. The Israeli army ensures the safety of the residents of the State of Israel. It is doing this in these very times. It fights terrorists from within, and provides deterrence against the many enemies who surround us from without. Iran, Egypt and Syria are not suspected of excess love for the Jewish People. They sit “quietly” only because of the Israeli Army. Therefore, whoever enlists in the army fulfills the mitzvah of “defending Israel from its enemies,” protecting the state’s inhabitants from slaughter by the enemies of the Jewish People.

The army also ensures Jewish sovereignty over sections of Eretz Yisrael. It is the central vehicle to fulfilling the mitzvah of settling the Land, enabling us “to prevent the Land from being in the hands of any other nation” (Ramban). Even if the army has betrayed its role regarding Gush Katif, it still continues to fulfill its role as far as the rest of Eretz Yisrael, from Kiryat Shemoneh to Eilat. We are angry at the army. We are angry at the heads of the security establishment. That anger is justified. It has to find expression via various kinds of protests, yet that does not free us from fulfilling an important mitzvah relating to the entire Jewish People. G-d has not exempted us from fulfilling this mitzvah.

2. A similar question has been dealt with in the past, and has already been decided by great rabbis of Israel. The question came up in relation to our integration in the Zionish Movement. The Zionist movement not only worked towards Jews moving to Zion, but expressed its position regarding the borders of the Land. It was ready to concede many portions of Eretz Yisrael, and at a certain point it even considered exchanging Eretz Yisrael for Uganda. It formally proclaimed that it had nothing to do with religion, and when the State was first established, it worked against religion and made an effort to distance new immigrants from their religious roots. Therefore, there were those who called for people not to “enlist” in the Zionist Movement, and not to “serve” in its ranks. Yet many great rabbis called upon Jews to join it and to be active in it, due to its contribution towards the redemption of the Jewish People and the return to Zion. We have already mentioned a few times Rabbi Tzvi Yehuda Kook’s interpretation of the Jerusalem Talmud’s words, “Greater is the sanctification of G-d’s name than its profanation.” Isn’t it obvious that the former is greater than the latter? Yet, as Rav Tzvi Yehuda explained, even when G-d’s name is being simultaneously sanctified and profaned, the sanctification wins out. Such thinking led to the decision of many great rabbis in favor of Zionism, as well as to their decision in favor of enlisting in the army. The army’s activities greatly sanctify G-d’s name, and even though they sometimes profane His name as well (as with Jews being expelled from their land, a terrible profanation of His name), the sanctification is decisive.

3. The army is one of the central expressions of Israeli society in the aggregate, perhaps the most central of all. This has led to the deep bond of Israeli society with the army, and to their distaste for anyone who wishes to harm the army or to avoid its ranks. Therefore, whoever cuts himself off from the army cuts himself off from Israeli society. He can proclaim a thousand times over that he feels like part of the State of Israel and Israeli society despite his not having served, but Israeli society does not accept that and does not view him as part of it. In other words, the army is one of the central, tangible expressions of the Jewish People. Whoever sets himself apart from the army, literally sets himself apart from the Jewish People.

This brings us to the profound explanations appearing in Maharal and Rav Kook regarding one’s duty not to set oneself apart from the Jewish People under any circumstances. Maharal stresses that the argument over whether a Jew who sins remains a Jew or not focuses on individual Jews. Regarding the Jewish People in the aggregate, however, even if they worship idols they remain the Jewish People, and we do not cut ourselves off from them. Obviously there are different spiritual levels within the roots of the Jewish People. There is a spiritual hierarchy. Sometimes our people are called “Knesset Yisrael” [the assembly of Israel]; sometimes they are called “Tiferet Yisrael” [the glory of Israel], etc. The Jewish People remain pure and holy at all times. Still, it is not just the ideal “Jewish People” that we have to remain connected to, but also the real-life Jewish People in the flesh, “standing before us today, from the wood carriers to the water drawers.”

4. The petition against enlisting in the army is an expression of anger. Injustice arouses anger and requires a protest. One is allowed to be angry and to protest; it is even a mitzvah to protest. Yet it is forbidden for one’s anger to take control, because it is impossible to build by way of anger. Anger is a destructive force, not a constructive one. In response to the destructive proceedings being carried out by the State’s leadership, we must increase our rebuilding. We must increase our hold on the Land of Israel; our spiritual influence on the State; our social involvement; our rebuilding within the Jewish People, together with the Jewish People. We know that by way of this partnership, we will not encounter just light, but we must maintain it all the same. Let us continue to build within the Jewish People, together with the Jewish People.

Hence, we shall continue enlisting in the army, not because we take lightly what occurred; and not because we are indulgent towards those in the political and security establishment responsible for uprooting part of Eretz Yisrael, but because we feel a responsibility for the State’s future and an obligation to fulfill the Torah’s commandments.

Link to this: 16:42