האם רב יכול לעלות לארץ?

00:00 Speaker 1 This was a very important rav whose name we do not have. We don't know who this was written to, so we also don't know if he actually did what the Rebbe says. But he writes to the Rebbe, and the Rebbe writes back. He's responding to a letter that he received from him on Tes Zion Adar Rishon. This letter is being written right after on Chof Gimel Adar Rishon of fifty years ago. So exa- almost exactly fifty years ago because they had two Adars that year. You wrote to me about possibly moving to Eretz Yisrael and becoming a rav there. Maybe you'll join the Rabbonim in Eretz Yisrael. It's clear from the context of the letter that this had been a rav living in America, and he wanted to move to Eretz Yisrael and become a rav over there. So the Rebbe goes on. The Rebbe says, "I, I'm certain that you'll speak to other people in the area about this, everybody who's involved. I assume you're going to talk to all of the, uh... I expect you to speak to all of the elder Rabbonim in Eretz Yisrael since you're planning on moving there and joining the rabbinate. The Rebbe says, "I, I hope it's not necessary for me to tell you that I'm talking about you consulting not with, you know, side Rabbonim. I'm talking about you consulting with the Rabbonim who have proven themselves time and again. They've shown in the past in action that they're only afraid of heaven, and they're not

01:25 Speaker 1 afraid of other things. They're not afraid of the government. They're not afraid of a certain minister in the government. They're not afraid of a certain party. Or a certain, uh, group. And they're not worried about losing their money, and they're not worried about losing their honor. I want you to consult with the real deal, people who only fear God and not the potential negative outcomes in of their decisions in the-- in, in Rabbonim. They only fear Hashem." So he says that he wants to move to Eretz Yisrael and become a rav, and, uh, and the Rebbe says to him, "I expect you to consult with the important Rabbonim there. Not just the important Rabbonim, but the Rabbonim who fear heaven. the Rebbe's signature." And then comes the PS. As with a lot of these letters, the, the, the action happens in the PS. I, I'm asking for appropriate . Excuse me. The Rebbe apologizes however much is necessary. And it says, "You're certainly aware of the terrible situation of the war that is going on for the existence of the Jewish people here in America, specifically among the youth. And they-- And you're aware of the fact that that the poor of your city have to come first, that the priority has to be local people who need your help, and that it's an issue of . So the Rebbe, after telling him, give-- giving him advice, "If you do wanna leave America and move to Eretz Yisrael, this is how I expect you to

02:49 Speaker 1 go about doing it. I wanna point out there are some problems here in America, and we need leaders here. You know that anybody who keeps one person alive, it's as if they've saved an entire world. Certainly, this applies even more to many nefashos. If you can save many more lives in America, then you'd be saving many, many worlds. We're gonna turn the page and click next at the top. It's loading for me. Ah. Says, "And you might think that maybe you'll move to Eretz Yisrael and you'll keep in touch with them." You know, you'll send, you'll send letters, I guess, back then. Nowadays, you'll keep a WhatsApp group together, right? You certainly will not be able to have a proper effect, anything like the effect you had before from a distance. Even though it's true, we don't cry about what happened already. We don't cry out about things that have happened. We shouldn't complain about things we can't change. This has to do with tomorrow. It's not in the past. It's a future. And anybody who wants, they have they have permission to make their own decisions. No one can stop them. So what the Rebbe's saying is, "You haven't moved yet, and I know that this is planned, and it sounds like maybe this was even planned for tomorrow, but nonetheless, uh, you can still change your mind and choose not to move." I, I delayed sending this letter, the Rebbe says. Because I really debated whether I should have included this PS. I

04:19 Speaker 1 came to the final decision that at the very least, in a short way, I had an obligation to write to you and tell you that you really shouldn't be leaving. It's also to be silent in situations like this. Says, "And as I said before, I'm, I'm asking for your-- I'm asking for your forgiveness in writing such harsh words." But the Rebbe's saying, "Look, I can give you advice about how to end up there, but I don't think you should end up there. You shouldn't be leaving America to go to Eretz Yisrael to be a rav." Uh, this, as you may know, is the Rebbe's position across the board. This is a very common position of the Rebbe, that Rabbonim especially, and also community leaders in really any capacity, have no permission to leave their flocks to go to Eretz Yisrael, even though there is the going to Eretz Yisrael. I sent you a supplementary section that has a whole bunch of letters on this topic. I wanna go through a couple of them very quickly, pieces of them, where I think the Rebbe pulls out different points. And then like we did yesterday, we'll do sort of a summary of other things that show up in the Rebbe's letters on this particular issue. So what we have from this letter is that he shouldn't leave. Uh, there's a letter that is from where the Rebbe compares community leaders to captains of a ship. Now this is a, this is a joke y- a lot of

05:23 Speaker 1 you know I used to fly airplanes. This is a joke that we used to tell, that airplane pilots tell all the time, is that why can you trust a pilot more than a surgeon? The answer is because if because if the plane crashes, he goes down too, but if the surgeon fails, he gets to go home. So you can trust the pilot because he has a stake in this, right? He has, he has a stake in this. The Rebbe says something very-- The Rebbe doesn't tell this joke, but the Rebbe says something very similar to somebody planning on leaving America to go to Eretz Yisrael. He says, Says a captain, He says, "Everybody understands. World-- The world over," and it's also, he says, a Torah thing. I don't know where it is in our Torah, but he says, that a captain is always the last one to leave his ship. And that's not just an honor thing the Rebbe says, it's actually a functional thing. we see explicitly. the moment that I know that I'm not leaving this ship, uh, that I'm not leaving the ship, the moment I know I'm stuck here, this immediately wakens up the inner strength of the captain and in a lot of cases he saves the ship because he knows he can't evacuate. When a captain realizes that they don't have a way out, that they can't just run away, they're inspired to do their work better. So the Rebbe writes to this individual saying that part of the

06:38 Speaker 1 reason why it's so important for Rabbonim community leaders and lay leaders too to stay in, to stay in the Golus if they're in Golus right now, is because they're the captains of that ship, and when a captain of the ship recognizes that they have no choice but to stay, they work harder to get everybody out safely to bring Mashiach. Uh, you don't really feel that urge if you're able to leave at any time. So we have a knowing you can go down with the ship inspires better captains. This is a letter I'd never seen before that really strikes this next one, that really strikes to the way that I was raised. I was raised around a lot of Zionists, Frum Zionists. Um, I went to a Hesder Yeshiva for a year. I'm, I'm used to Frum Zionists, and one of the big points there is op-is opposite of the Rebbe Shita, is that absolutely every Rav needs to be making Aliyah and the Rabbonim living in Chol Ha'aretz are bad examples. This is the Shita that I was taught. Is that every Rav living outside of Eretz Israel is like a Rav who walks around eating treif or being Mechalel Shabbos. There's a mitzvah of Yishuv Ha'aretz, and here they are demonstrating they don't care about it. So, uh, there was, there was-

07:29 Speaker 2 Yeah, this was also, this was also a big argument among secular Zionists, this point. If one could be a Zionist outside the land of Israel, or does one must move to the land of Israel?

07:41 Speaker 1 Right. I was, uh-

07:42 Speaker 2 Ben Gurion held, Ben Gurion held one must. If you don't live in Israel... Uh, and there were many-

07:52 Speaker 1 I cut you, you cut out of the bit at the end there, but, uh, but I think we caught the, the Tochin. Just-

07:56 Speaker 2 I, I say there were ma-there were many of them that argued with him and said, "No, there is a way to be in the diaspora and to work for this, you know, for Eretz Yisrael, for the people. You don't have to move there." Obviously, that's a great goal, but it is not like the be all and end all.

08:09 Speaker 1 Well, certainly when it came to the Frum Zionists that I was, that I was, that I was around, the idea always was this is a mitzvah, and you know, not doing a mitzvah is a serious problem. Uh, and the pro Aliyah folk who are trying to pu-who try to push Aliyah are always trying to recruit Rabbonim. The Rebbe has a letter here where he says that he has repeatedly asked them not to do this. This is a letter from Yud Tes Kislev Taf Shin Lamed Alef. Um, I, I've never heard this before. The Rebbe says, "Many, many years already, I've been begging and begging the Roshei Hasakanim Aliyah, the people mainly involved in the Alu-Aliyah movement, When it comes to recruiting people from Chol Ha'aretz, don't start with the Rabbonim. I don't want you to do that. Says, they destroy Chol Ha'kilos. That when they do this, it destroys their, it destroys their congregations. They, they end up listening to you, they go, and their congregations fall apart. And then the Rebbe adds this line near the end, he says that when they arrive, and these are Rabbonim then arrive, and then all of the people in Eretz Yisrael congratulate them on the brave decision they made to come here, and the truth is they've destroyed their communities and left their, left their flocks behind. So the Rebbe says, "I've been begging people who are in, who are into Aliyah to start with, you know, start with the regular people. Don't start with the leaders,

09:19 Speaker 1 'cause you take the leaders out of a community, you destroy the community." There's a letter in Yud Beis Kislev Taf Shin Chaf Beis, where the Rebbe deals with the issue of mitzvah, of the mitz-mitzvah of Yishuv Eretz Yisrael. Like I just mentioned earlier, what was always waved in front of my face is that this is a mitzvah. We have to do Yishuv Eretz Yisrael, and it's not especially now that we can, and that there's no excuse for staying in America. This is something you'll see on a lot of the, in a lot of the seforim. I think Emet V'Hasemech pushes it pretty hard as a, as a, as a possible point, but it wasn't even possible to live there then. Um, certainly this has become very popular. So somebody writes to the Rebbe saying, a Rav writes to the Rebbe saying that he wants to leave his congregation, not because he wants to, but he just can't get out of his head the idea that he's missing out on the mitzvah of Yishuv Eretz Yisrael. The Rebbe writes back, the Rebbe says, "Mitzvah, M-The mitzvah of Yishuv Eretz Yisrael, there's a Machloket. We're not sure it's Deoraita. It might be Derabanan. It might be Vechul," which means it might even be just a midah. It's lav davka that it is a mitzvah Deoraita to settle Eretz Yisrael. The Rebbe is not clear on that at all. the Rebbe said. what is definitely true according to all deos is that mitzvah of Achar Ona Kemech L'olad

10:24 Speaker 1 L'Beiteira. There's no Machloket that Achar Ona Kemech is number one. So we can debate what the value is of Yishuv Eretz Yisrael, but not the value of Achar Ona Kemech. And then he goes on and says, it is a Psak Din in Shulchan Aruch. That was unnecessary to translate. the poor of your city come first. the Rebbe says this is all deos, all deos, every opinion agrees, Deoraita, that the poor people of your city come first. So yeah, there is on one hand a possible problem that the Rabbonim living in America are not fulfilling a mitzvah that might be Deoraita, it might be Derabanan, it might be Vechul of Yishuv Eretz Yisrael, but on the other hand, what we have is a Psak Din in Shulchan Aruch that everybody agrees and that your poor people of your city need to come first. And we also have a, uh, a, a universal principle of Achar Ona Kemech taking care of, uh, taking care of others, um, as a L'olad L'Beiteira. So the Rebbe says these are definite things. You can't be, you can't be caught up in these individual mitzvahs. The Rebbe in other letters calls this a Yetzer Hara. Now, the Yetzer Hara telling you, "Look, you have this mitzvah that might be a mitzvah, whereas you're throwing away all the mitzvahs directly in front of you." The Rebbe clarifies in the letter from Tes Vav Tevet of Taf Shin Lamed Beis that the situation outside of Eretz Yisrael is Koach Nefesh Mamash, and that

11:31 Speaker 1 that's not the case in Eretz Yisrael. I think that's controversial, and I think we could make the claim that over time that has changed. I don't know if it has. You could make the claim that nowadays this wouldn't be the situation, but the Rebbe does say, I'll read a little line of it to you, that, uh, this is a person's writing, they wanna move from Africa. and in the diaspora in general, that's literal Koach Nefesh. it was simple to understand that it's just not as serious there. I think that's probably still the case, my own opinion, is that although they need help in Eretz Yisrael with their youth and with secularism in Eretz Yisrael, there is sort of-- Yet you, you meet Israelis who come here, they're, they're somewhat connected at least. There are people here who on the surface have no connection at all, and the Rebbe says it's just not the same thing. I expect, I expect people who are working in, uh, in, in Community leadership in outside of Eretz Israel to stay. He says, uh, here, this is a, this is a, a sharp language here. "Shekol Rav v'Reish Mesivta." He says, any Rav, any Reish Mesivta, u'madrich ruchani, anybody who's a madrich ruchani, I don't know how to translate that exactly. A, a, a spiritual guide. So that means even someone who doesn't really have a role, but they're s- providing spiritual guidance to their community. Ha'eizev b'tikvas einam nowadays, who leaves nowadays, chug be'chutz la'aretz, their position in chutz

12:42 Speaker 1 la'aretz, u'matik l'eretz ha'kodesh and moves to Eretz Yisrael, harei ze bedugma sar tava be'erech mimarachas-- mimaracha beshas hamilchamah. This is like a captain leaving the battlefield during the war, u've'eis hastaf hasasanam, in the time when they're about to start losing, when the, when the enemy is getting stronger. He doesn't say this applies to some people. That lashon there once again is shekol, every single Rav, Reish Mesivta, madrich ruchani who leaves their post nowadays, the Rebbe sees them as deserters. Um, there's another letter where he calls them deserters. It was actually written in English originally, and, uh, it says here that, that many people fled the United States and other countries, but they should have remained there on the front lines of the battle for the survival of the Jewish people, and their departure resulted in serious deterioration of Judaism in their cities and communities. And the Rebbe says, "I consider them deserters on the battle, on the battlefront, every single one of them." The Rebbe says in that letter, that may seem too harsh a criticism, but it reflects reality. That's the truth. I didn't find any letters that, that buck this particular trend. Um, if you're aware of one, please, uh, please speak up or put them in the, um, or put them in the WhatsApp group. Just to review what we saw from these letters, I made a little list of the major points that come out of these letters. We have the one that we learned today. We have that knowing you--

13:50 Speaker 1 that you'll go down with the ship inspires better captains, so that means that staying in, uh, in chutz la'aretz until Mashiach comes will make you better at your job. Uh, two, probably, uh, people need to leave the Rabbonim alone, and we need to stop congratulating Rabbonim who make aliyah. They're doing the wrong thing, not the right thing. Uh, three, ve'achareicha komeicha and ani ira-- ani eiracha, ani eiracha kidmin override any possible issue of yishuv ha'aretz. Midra-- That might be midrasha, it might not be. Um, the situation in chutz la'aretz is pachuach nefesh mamash, and certainly more so than it is in Eretz Yisrael. And the Rebbe considers anybody who leaves posts of spiritual influence to move to Eretz Yisrael deserters in the heat of battle.

14:27 Speaker 2 And I'll add that it's even... Yeah, it-- the intermarriage rate among secular Jews in America is seventy-five percent, so it's only much, much worse than when the Rebbe wrote it even, not better. And the intermarriage rate among secular Israelis is three percent, two percent, one percent. So the point that was then is only stronger now, if anything.

14:55 Speaker 3 Good stuff, Nebychiel. Ishkayach.

14:57 Speaker 1 I'm not clear on, uh, something I'm not clear on in any of these letters is how far you extend this pass for Rabbonim. So the Rebbe very clearly opens the door to the fact that this isn't just the case of a, of a, of a shul or community Rav or Rosh Yeshiva, this extends a little further. I'm not sure at what point you fall into a category where the Rebbe won't give the hetter to leave. This, uh-

15:14 Speaker 4 There, there are a lot of letters where the Rebbe, uh, where the Rebbe... Letters, even the sicha, actually. There's a sicha, um, where the-- looking at the... I forgot where it is. I could find it for you. Very sharp sicha where the Rebbe basically, like, puts down the whole aliyah concept because peop- people basically do it to get holier than thou. And the Rebbe's like, "You have to consider the immense responsibility that you have when you go to Eretz Yisrael, that you're in a holy place, and v'lesoch yechareta es ham. So you have to behave in a way-- If you're not ready to embrace the full kedushah of Eretz Yisrael, you should not move there."

15:45 Speaker 2 Many people-

15:45 Speaker 4 Very clear

15:45 Speaker 2 ... got rachus to move.

15:46 Speaker 4 Yeah.

15:46 Speaker 2 Many people got rachus to move.

15:48 Speaker 4 But as a-

15:48 Speaker 2 The Rebbe sta-- The Rebbe already established Par Chabad and moved the roiv minyan of minyan of Lubavitch from Europe there. Obviously, it's depending on the situation. I think what's very, very clear is that these Rabbonim, who were Rabbonim, who were leaders or people of influence that would then leave a community, that's where the fire was. The Rebbe was like, "No, that is hepcha kavanah. You're going away from a weak community in Johannesburg or wherever it may be to go live your dream in Efrat. It doesn't work." I think that is-

16:19 Speaker 1 I can tell you that, uh-

16:20 Speaker 2 Then on an individual basis, I think the Rebbe gave regular people many, many different answers. Yes, no, there was-

16:26 Speaker 4 But I'm saying the Rebbe sp-- the Rebbe focused on the reasons for aliyah

16:29 Speaker 2 My grandfather said, no. And, and then to leave that, you know that the Rebbe was vehemently against people leaving Eretz Yisrael.

16:34 Speaker 4 But that was also part of the thing. You can't move there because if you're, if you're gonna wanna leave-

16:38 Speaker 2 No

16:38 Speaker 4 ... it's gonna be a problem.

16:38 Speaker 2 But even I'm saying there was also like that whole, you know, nobody's allowed to leave Eretz Yisrael.

16:42 Speaker 4 Right.

16:43 Speaker 2 So it's, it's people, you know. But many people got rachus to move, many people were discouraged from moving. So-

16:49 Speaker 1 My, my parents, my parents went to the Rebbe, wrote into the Rebbe many times when they were first, uh, to-- came to Lubavitch, that they wanted to move to Eretz Yisrael, many times. And the Rebbe did not answer them. And then finally, they went into yechidus. Those were back in the days when you had yechidus when you wanted to buy a new car, you know, or whatever. So they went into yechidus, and, uh, my father wrote in his, in his, in his pandek, you know, we've written to the Rebbe. Uh, we, we're asking about... I don't think he wrote we've written to the Rebbe. We, uh, wrote in asking again about moving to Eretz Yisrael. So the Rebbe answered him, "A Yid fragt einmol, zvei mol, drei mol." A Yid is asking once, twice, three times to move to Eretz Yisrael. How can I tell him no? But, "Abes zolst vissen az mayen ratzon is fakhet." But you should know that my will is the opposite.

17:31 Speaker 2 Right.

17:32 Speaker 1 So here they-- My, my mother always wanted to live on a kibbutz. She always had this, like, hippie side of her. She wanted to move to the kibbutz or whatever, and the Rebbe basically told them no.

17:40 Speaker 2 Right. Right.

17:42 Speaker 1 And the results are that I'm sitting wearing a pink shirt.

17:46 Speaker 2 And you would have had it open, and it would have been open more buttons on top. That's all.

17:50 Speaker 1 It's already one button open already to be-

17:53 Speaker 2 No.

17:53 Speaker 1 It's, it's-

17:54 Speaker 2 People got such answers. I know such, such. And then people got answers, yes. Depends. Rabbis, no. Leaders, no.

18:02 Speaker 1 'Cause you have, you have people that have moved their entire communities

18:06 Speaker 5 From America to Eretz Yisrael. There's a, there's, um-

18:09 Speaker 3 Rabbi Riskin

18:09 Speaker 5 There's a Rabbi Reshit, um, I forgot his name. He came from, like, Long Island, West Hempstead to Long Island.

18:13 Speaker 3 Moving an entire community is a little different. Moving an entire community, you know, is very different than moving yourself. Whatever.

18:18 Speaker 5 So the, uh, the Rebbe has a letter in the supplementary thing that I sent you. You'd have to dig around for it. I can pull it out and put it in the group where he seems to be answering a question like that. He doesn't directly answer it, but he-- the Rebbe says, "Even if you were to take your Mishpacha with you, what about the person who would talk to the person about your good action and doesn't see you anymore?" The Rebbe seems to feel that a, a community Rav's ripple effect is so substantial that even if he thinks he's taking his community, he's actually destroying a community.

18:41 Speaker 3 Communities aren't as insular as you think they are. Yeah. I mean, like, there's always an effect.

18:46 Speaker 5 Yeah, I'll pull that letter out and put it in the WhatsApp. That's, uh-

18:49 Speaker 3 Right. So like, I think this goes back to what Yechiel was saying before, like how far does this extend, right? So if you have a businessman, right? So, so, you know, Moishe Pads, you know, ev-everybody here in this, in this group who puts on Tefillin in the office-

18:59 Speaker 5 Yeah. I mean, any of us who have shluchim, it's a reasonable question, right?

19:03 Speaker 3 You know, who puts on Tefillin in an office or gives matzos to his colleagues or whatever it is. Like, do they now have that same responsibility of, of, of, "Hey, if you leave, who's gonna do this? And what right do you have to then just cut out, cut and run because it's better for your family or whatever?" Unless you just absolutely do nothing, which I find hard to believe. And hey, you, Moishe. Yeah. That's something that's not clear to me from any of the letters is, is at what point, at, at what point the line falls between normal person and, and responsibility to stay where you can even ask the question. 'Cause the Rebbe doesn't even wanna be asked the question. He writes in a couple places, "Pele, oh pele, that you would even ask me," or, "A Rav, you obviously can't leave." I wanna know when the pele stops and when it starts being a question. I don't know what, what, what person that is. Uh, it's pele, pele with a Rav, but-

19:46 Speaker 5 Pele. The other part of it is maybe, maybe the other part of it is maybe also, like, laypeople doing the same type stuff has increased tremendously over the last years, right? So it's like the people that like, you know, I-- that didn't go on shlichus who are forced to doing business for whatever reason, but they still have that, like, that fire in them that they wanna do shlichus with people versus maybe thirty, forty years ago, the people that didn't go on shlichus and the people that went into business didn't have that fire to go put on mezuzah on-- go put on Tefillin on their colleagues or give shiurim or, or give out matzos or stuff like that.

20:18 Speaker 3 Yeah. Maybe that's changed. Maybe we've all been deputized.

20:22 Speaker 5 I believe we have. I mean, at least by our desire. You know, the Rebbe said it many times that everybody's a shliach wherever he is, but then when you, when you're forced not to be on shlichus and you wanna do other things 'cause you wanna still be one of the Rebbe soldiers, so you start doing shlichus wherever you are, and then that basically blocks you from going to Eretz Yisrael.