Date and Place: 11 Shevat 5670, Yafo
Recipient: Rav Pinchas Hakohen Lintop, the rabbi of a Chassidic community in Lithuania. He had learned Kabbala with Rav Kook when Rav Kook was in Boisk. The two were very deep and like-minded thinkers. We have previously seen a letter between them (#184), written a year earlier.
Body: [The discussion had just turned to philosophical matters. In the background, Rav Lintop apparently critiqued Rav Kook’s recent article, “Derech Hatechiya”]
The feeling of belief in Hashem, which is so strong, comes first. We need to strengthen it specifically at this time to make it as broad, general, and all-encompassing as can be. Afterward, we can begin clarifying concepts that have developed to the left and to the right. This requires extracting the impurities that lost their efficacy when they strayed too far. It also requires removing internal chaff from the estate of Jacob, the pure man who is missing nothing. It even has the substance that “draws out the undesirable parts of a pot of food, which it absorbed during cooking.” It is worthwhile to maintain the nation’s honor and present its impurities to it in privacy, so that it can maintain its ability to march forward with valor, using its spirit, which knows its purity and truthfulness.
However, why should I speak in this venue (i.e., his recent article) about the difference between humanity in general and the unique nation and between the collective and its individuals. All of these points are special subsets of the overall enquiry; they are very appropriate when the time comes for details, but they have no special place when one first just looks into basic, broad ideas. The specific distinctions melt away when the overarching generalities shine in bright light. It is not that the individuals melt away or that “existence” gets any closer to earth, as Hashem is “a sun and a protector” (Tehillim 84:12), and Hashem “created the world to be inhabited, not to be void” (Yeshayahu 45:18).
However, the contrasting differences are responsible for a situation whereby every individual interferes with his peer, every piece of logic contradicts another, each group has a certain enmity toward a different group, and each individual has the attitude of “I alone shall rule.” This form of void can be fixed by shining objectivity [at the misconceivers]. The divisive people who damage the world and commit iniquities cannot look at all-inclusive light and are broken by the power of their own destructiveness.
We must present many high-quality introductions before we make the world capable of understanding how special Hashem’s revelations through miracles are. The divine good, stands strongly in the heart of the only nation which, from its inception, carries Hashem’s banner and prepares the world to recognize the phenomenon of miracles. It is a pity that there should be a spiritual leader whose soul is not connected to the light of Hashem’s wonders that were done in the past and does not look forward to see their light in the future.
[We should understand] the gradual manner in which the spirit of life will return to the heart of our nation, which is fainting with a thirst for the clearly pronounced word of Hashem. It is through the straightening of the path of the wellspring of life which flows through the nature of the Jewish soul. This is connected to the belief, from the nation’s infancy, in unfathomable miracles, which can exist even during historical developments that hide the light of Hashem. These too are revelations of Hashem in the physical and spiritual world, as the world progresses in straightforward and complex ways. We must constantly have the inclination to appreciate goodness. The divine goodness that is revealed through harsh judgment will, in the future, appear with lightning bolts of glowing light more powerful than the superficial good that is revealed from sentimental love that will not conquer the paths of life or lead human society in all the ways of its life.
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