Igrot Hare’aya – Letters of Rav Kook: Deeper Literature – part II

#188 – part II

Date and Place: 19 Shevat 5669 (1909), Yafo

Recipient: Rav Isser Zalman Meltzer, Rabbi and Rosh Yeshiva of Slutzk. Rav Isser Zalman overlapped with Rav Kook in the Yeshivas Volozhin and was also a great lover of Eretz Yisrael. Years later, they would reunite in Jerusalem, with Rav Kook as the Chief Rabbi and Rav Isser Zalman as the Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivat Etz Chaim, where many of Rav Kook’s most prominent supporters taught and studied. Rav Meltzer was the author of Even Haezel on the Rambam, and, of significance here, was the editor of the Torah Journal, Yagdil Torah.

Body: [Last time we saw Rav Kook begin to explain why there was a need for a deeper philosophical/spiritual approach than was presented in the Yagdil Torah journal in order to attract the young and searching. The last point was a partial admission that not all young scholars can develop in the new approach. However, Rav Kook claimed that many can.]

Especially at a time like this, when matters impact us in the most significant ways, we should be able [to identify a serious number of young scholars to become experts in deep spirituality] among those whose spirit is receptive to giving much of their energies to in-depth spiritual studies, with hard work and internal joy. For them, we must open wide entranceways like the width of the entrances to great halls. May many “sail in these waters and increase knowledge.”

By means of the efforts of the choice, elite scholars, we will merit to present alongside the literature of Halacha and standard aggadic literature [as appears in Yagdil Torah], other works of literature that are more literary, and are holy and light-emitting, full with all of the splendor and aura of life to the fullest sense. These works shall be outstanding in their beauty and adornment, and even more so in their truth and strength compared to the charm that is found in the new [secular] literature, whose many edges are full of poison and destruction.

[If we succeed in this,] we will attract bands of people, including those who are presently in the camp of the enemy, because a live word, written in the style that fits this generation’s desire for the most internal spirituality, has still not been heard from the great Torah leaders, whose ideas are grounded in the Torah.

I hope that you, oh respected Torah scholar, will use the platform of your dear journal to generate interest in the question that we need to solve. When you elevate to prominence lofty ideas that inspire the soul that are based on Torah sources, it will [also] make prominent the return of parts of the nation to living in the Desired Land. This can be done by the strength of Torah scholars who know how to “be bold in supporting Hashem,” by beginning to give public addresses on matters of public affairs on the highest and most expansive level. This can be done on a high intellectual level with a spirit of life, pleasantness, and robustness. This will uncover and display the splendor of the Torah and those who study it seriously, as they impact the whole nation.

I am bound to hope and look for redemption, from the holy mountains, which is the place where the dew of light and life are embedded in the land, and will spread to Israel and Hashem’s Torah, which is in their hearts.