Fear Makes You Do Dumb Things

by Lisa Liel

Poor Naftali Bennett. He’s terrified.

“Every vote for Feiglin brings the bulldozer closer to your home. It will be a vote you regret casting.”

That’s what Bennett said last night at a Jerusalem Post election event, even as thousands of excited Zehut supporters filled Hangar 11 in Tel Aviv for the Zehut Final Stretch conference, a week before Knesset elections.

It’s hard for him. Bennett took over the old National Religious Party, and abandoned them to millions of shekels of debt while he and Ayelet Shaked created their “New Right” party, which is neither new, nor particularly right. And now, while Zehut rises in the polls, his party is sinking. He may not even pass the threshold. It’s understandable that he’s scared. His political life is in imminent danger.

But his behavior is appalling. Graceless. Sad.

When MK Litzman brought a bill before the Knesset to require the signatures of 80 MKs before they would be allowed to even start talking about negotiating on Jerusalem, what did Bennett do? The same thing as Bibi and Shaked and the entirenational camp. They ran off from the Knesset floor so they wouldn’t have to vote on it. They found Arab MKs in the Knesset cafeteria and sent them back in to make doubly sure the measure failed.

Who was the one man in the national camp who voted for Litzman’s bill? Moshe Feiglin. Who was the one man who repeatedly broke party discipline to vote against the budget in an effort to prevent the freeing of thousands of terrorist murderers? Moshe Feiglin.

Shame on you, Naftali Bennett. You watched as Jewish homes and towns were demolished and never even threatened to leave the government. You watched as three waves of terrorist murderers were released and never even threatened to leave the government. You came out publicly in favor of the torture of Jewish kids in Shin Bet basements in order to force them to make false confessions about the Duma arson. In fact, the only time you ever threatened to leave the government was when Lieberman resigned and you decided you wanted the Defense Ministry. And even then, in only a day or two, you folded like a cheap card table.

Now all you can do is brazenly copy the policies of someone better than you, and make false accusations about him. I understand that you’re scared. Your new party may not even pass the threshold, because real supporters of Eretz Yisrael are abandoning you in droves to vote for Zehut. I understand your fear, but your behavior is shameful.

Don't Let Lapid-Nissenkorn Give Your Money to the Unions: Vote ZEHUT

The Sky is the Limit (interviews with participants from Tuesday night Zehut Conference)

Will ZEHUT's Economic Policies Harm Local Production?

Gilad Alper explains how an open market is best for local producers and small business.

Moshe Feiglin on Fake News and ZEHUT's Real Plans

Rav Kook on Parashat Tazria: A Return to Ritual Purity

These Torah readings discuss at length topics that are among the most challenging for us to relate to. What relevance do the laws of ritual purity and impurity - after childbirth, for lepers and for various types of male and female discharges - hold for us? Why does the Torah place such emphasis on these matters? Why do we feel so far removed from them?

The Taharah Axiom

In his book Orot, Rav Kook posited the following principle: “The degree of purity required is a function of the comprehensiveness of the spiritual framework.” The more inclusive a framework is, encompassing more aspects of life, the more rigorous are the requirements for taharah, ritual purity.

The Temple and its service are a classic example. The Temple projected an ethical and holy influence on a wide range of life’s aspects - from the noble heights of divine inspiration and prophecy, through the powers of imagination and the emotions (the outbursts of joy and awe in the Temple service), all the way down to the physical level of flesh and blood (the actual sacrifices). Because its impact reached even the lowest levels of physical existence - which are nonetheless integrally connected to all other aspects of life in an organic whole - the Temple and its service required an exact and precise purity.

By contrast, a spiritual and moral influence that is directed only towards the intellect does not require such a refined degree of physical purity. Thus, the Sages taught, Torah may be studied even when impure.

“'Is not My word like fire? says the Lord’ (Jer. 23:29) - Just as fire does not become impure, so too, words of Torah cannot become impure.” (Berachot 22a)

Changes throughout History

As the Jewish people returned from exile in Babylonia and rebuilt the Temple, it was necessary to revive the Temple’s strict requirements of taharah. For this reason, Ezra enacted a series of enactments stressing the need for greater ritual purity during this period.

The long exile that followed the Second Temple period, however, greatly weakened the emotive and imaginative abilities of the people. The intensity and aesthetic quality of spiritual life became impoverished, and the corresponding need for a rigorous degree of purity was accordingly diminished. Thus we find that one of the six orders of the Mishnah (compiled in the Land of Israel) is Taharot, dealing exclusively with matters of ritual purity. Of the 37 tractates of the Talmud (composed in the Babylonian exile), however, only one belongs to this order. Similarly, the Talmud repealed Ezra’s decree obligating immersion before Torah study.

What remained for the Jewish people in exile? Only the Torah and its intellectual influence. It still involved the physical realm through the practical observance of mitzvot, but the intermediate stages of imagination and feeling were bypassed. In exile, we lament, ‘Nothing remains but this Torah’ (from the Selichot prayers).

In the long centuries of exile, meticulousness in matters of ritual purity lost its obligatory nature. It became associated with idealistic longings, the province of the pious few.

A Return to Taharah

The Hasidic movement of the 1700s aspired to restore the concepts of physical purity to the masses. Hasidism places a greater emphasis on the imaginative and emotional faculties - particularly through prayer and song - than the intellectual. As a result, it awakened a greater need for personal and physical purity. This objective certainly contains a healthy kernel, although it needs additional direction and refinement.

Especially now, with the national renascence of the Jewish people in the Land of Israel, these aspirations for physical taharah should be renewed and expanded. Our national renewal complements the renewed yearning for spirituality; and the healthy desire to restore the nation and heal its national soul applies to all aspects of life, including physical purity.

It is precisely in the camps of the Jewish army that the Torah demands a high level of purity:

“For the Lord your God makes His presence known in your camp, so as to deliver you and grant you victory over your enemy. Your camp must therefore be holy.” (Deut. 23:15)

Together with the renewal of our national strength and vitality, there must be a corresponding reinforcement of emotive and physical purity. This will help prepare the basis for an integrated national life that encompasses a complete rebirth of the people: from the highest intellectual pursuits, to the simple joy in life and living.

Handing Gaza to Abbas Will Solve Nothing

by Maj. Gen. (res.) Gershon Hacohen



EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: Overthrowing Hamas and handing rule in Gaza to Mahmoud Abbas will not bring about a solution to the Gaza problem. It was, after all, Yasser Arafat, Abbas’s predecessor as PLO leader, who transformed Gaza into an ineradicable terrorist hotbed by flouting the Oslo Accords that he had signed. The solution to the Gaza problem does not lie in Ramallah but rather in the Strip’s historic hinterland – the Sinai Peninsula.

Continue to full article ->

HaRav Nachman Kahana: How does one replace the irreplaceable?

BS”D
Parashat Tazria 5779
by HaRav Nachman Kahana

Parashat Shemini closes with the dietary laws, stating specifically those species of animal life which may be eaten, and parashat Tazriah opens with the halachic ramifications (laws) for a woman who has given birth to a child.

Rashi explains that the Torah did this in ascending halachic order of kedusha (sanctity) from the humble animal world to the privileged status of a Jewish person.

We will return to this be”H (with the help of HaShem).

Last Shabbat, parashat Shemini, my attention was drawn to two specific personalities: Aharon HaKohen in the parasha, and Yehoshua bin Nun whose yartzeit (date of death) fell on that day. Although the specific crises facing these holy people were entirely different, both were made to bear profound burdens which would have undone lesser men.

Aharon HaKohen had just lost two of his oldest and most competent sons while they were serving God in the Mishkan (Tabernacle). Yet he was commanded by HaShem to complete his tasks despite his profound personal tragedy.

The Torah describes Aharon’s irreconcilable personal trauma in two thunderous words “Va’yiedom Aharon” – And Aharon was silent.

Yehoshua bin Nun was commanded by HaShem to fulfill an impossible mission: he was to follow Moshe Rabbeinu as the leader of the Jewish people.

How does one replace the irreplaceable?

How can Yehoshua direct the elders who are whispering behind his back, “The face of Moshe was like the sun, the face of Yehoshua is like the moon”?

How can Yehoshua assume halachic authority when the Torah is called ‘Torat Moshe’ (the Torah of Moshe)?

How can he lead the people of Israel into the land so holy that even the illustrious Moshe did not merit to enter? And will the army of Israel do battle with forces many times mightier than they at the command of Yehoshua?

Yehoshua was so discouraged, that twice in chapter one of the Book of Yehoshua, Hashem sees the need to encourage him with the call to be strong and brave of heart.

Where did Aharon and Yehoshua find the inner strength to overcome their great burdens, and complete their tasks?

They transcended their individual, emotional limitations caused by sadness and pain, feelings of inferiority and mortality, by realizing that they were the instruments of Hashem – and instruments do not cry.

Aharon had to discharge the service that was intended to complete what was only begun during the six days of creation – to connect the metaphysical, spiritual universe with the lowly physical world through the “umbilical cord” of Torah and mitzvot within the holy womb of Eretz Yisrael.

Yehoshua was no longer just the loyal student and attaché of the great leader. His self-image had to change. He was propelled into a role which he never dreamt could occur – to replace the irreplaceable, to advance from being led and to assume the role of leader. He was no longer the son of Nun, he was now the father of the nation. No longer a pawn in the many pieces of HaShem’s nation, but the instrument of HaShem to replace the glorious instrument which had become broken and left behind in a valley near the Mountain of Nevo.

In Eretz Yisrael, the 27th of Nissan is set aside as the national day of remembrance of the victims and the murderers of the Shoah.

At the close of the Second World War, the Jewish people found themselves at the nadir of our history. When the truth of what had befallen our people became apparent, that one third of our nation was murdered, a profound sense of despair and demoralization descended upon our people. Many Jews sought escape from the fact of that they were born Jewish, in shame and embarrassment. “Where was God?” was the question most asked. But the rabbis had no answers. One answer surely is “Where was man?”

HaShem, in His infinite wisdom, caused us to rise above our self-pity and national depression to become instruments in His world plan. The Jewish people were mobilized to do the impossible – to recreate a national home in our ancient land for the millions of Jews who were to turn their backs on the galut [exile] and return home. There was no time for self-pity. There were hundreds of thousands of survivors languishing in the camps of Europe, and anti-Semitism was being unleashed against the Jews in many Arab and Moslem lands. A State had to be carved out from the mountain of rocks and in the barren sands of the Negev. His Royal Majesty’s mandate over Palestine was in effect, and the Royal Navy blockaded the coasts in order to prevent the threat of the broken bodies and spirits of Jews who thirsted to feel the holy land under their feet. Arabs murdered Jews at will in Eretz Yisrael, in the best case with the apathetic indifference of His Majesty’s soldiers, and in most cases with their active weapons support and logistical help.

In these circumstances no thinking, breathing, feeling Jew could wallow in the luxury of self-pity. The instruments of HaShem were put to work.

The British were expelled from the land. The Arab marauders were held at bay and the seven Arab armies which invaded the emerging Jewish State were miraculously driven back. Millions of Jews were absorbed into society and the “image of God” was restored to them.

Again, the knowledge that we were the instruments of HaShem allowed the Jews of Eretz Yisrael an achievement of the impossible – to return home after 2000 years of varying degrees of Shoah.

Today, we are again facing challenges which would bring lesser nations to their knees. We are being threatened – almost daily – by Hitler’s evil heir in Tehran, while the world lazily yawns. The nation of Yisrael, numbering less than six million Jews, is being pitted against a world that echoes the words of Canada’s PM Mackenzie King when asked after the Second World War how many Jewish survivors he would let into the country, he responded “None is too many”.

On this background, the Jews of Eretz Yisrael will again be called to serve as the instruments of HaShem by rising above our parochial tzarot (problems) in His service.

As stated by Rashi in his commentary on this week’s parasha, the sequence of God’s Torah as the blueprint for the world is first to deal with the animal elements in nature, followed by the halachic laws for the Jewish nation. So, too, in human affairs. The animalistic drives of men will have to be dealt with first and only then will the world be ready to receive the holy teachings of the Torah.

There is yet much to be done before the completion of HaShem’s plan, which began on the six days of creation. The secret of our strength is the knowledge that we are HaShem’s instruments in that completion.

Shabbat Shalom,
Nachman Kahana
Copyright © 5779/2019 Nachman Kahana

Rabbi Ari Kahn on Parashat Tazria: Welcome to an Imperfect World

Don’t apologize

by Victor Rosenthal

Often I read “pro-Israel” articles, usually by American Jews, which include a statement like this: “Of course I disagree with many of Israel’s policies, but…” Or, “Of course, Israel treats the Palestinians badly, but…” Or, “Of course the occupation is immoral, but…”

I appreciate the “but,” and usually the article goes on to explain that the state really does have a right to exist, that Israel really isn’t guilty of genocide, or that people should be nicer to Jewish college students, who aren’t responsible for Israel’s policies.

But the apologetic prelude, an attempt to establish bona fides among an audience already marinated in anti-Israel propaganda, is cowardly and wrong.

Israel is doing the best she can, and much better than most Western democracies in the moral behavior department (I won’t even dream of comparing her to the various murderous dictatorships in the region).

Yes, a few Arabs have gotten shot to death while trying to do a World War Z number(video, 4:27) on our southern border fence. We should have invited them into our homes? If someone were climbing your back fence with a knife in his teeth, what would you do?

We tried, over and over, to give them a state. It was stupid, and we’re lucky they wouldn’t take it. Now they are refusing to talk. Good. They’ve demonstrated, in Gaza what happens when we give up control of territory. So, what, exactly, are we doing wrong when we don’t unilaterally leave the high ground near our center of population?

Yes, there are checkpoints that Arabs from the territories have to pass through to get into Israel. Several times a week, someone is stopped with a knife or worse. Often, terrorists sneak into Israel around the unfinished (why is that?) security barrier, and murder people. The checkpoints are a real pain in the ass for Arabs that work in Israel. How racist we must be to have them!

Yes, we arrest “children” (some as old as 17) for throwing rocks and firebombs at cars containing Jews. Sometimes the Jews in the cars are killed or maimed. How cruel we are, to children! And before you say it, it’s true that sometimes (much more rarely) Jewish kids throw rocks at Arabs. We arrest them too.

Arab terrorists stab Jews on the street or try to hit them with their cars. They incite their kids to murder.

The Gazans are setting fire to the southern part of our country with their balloons and kites, like last year, as soon as the weather has started to dry out. They threaten to tear down the border and “rip out the hearts” (video, 0:51) of the Jews who live nearby. A rocket from the Gaza Strip destroyed a house in central Israel the other day, and injured several people – only the fact that we require a reinforced concrete “safe room” in all new construction prevented a worse tragedy. We shoot down their rockets in the area around Gaza with the Iron Dome system, whose every launch costs us tens of thousands of dollars. Sometimes we don’t succeed, and the residents have 15 seconds or less to scramble into their safe rooms.

But there is so much to criticize in our “treatment of the Palestinians!” For example, we block the import of metal pipes (used to make rockets) and cement (to line tunnels under the border) to Gaza. After the most recent outbreak of rockets, incendiary devices, riots next to the border fence, and explosives thrown at our soldiers, we have promised to make life easier for Gazans by increasing the number of trucks carrying food, medicines and other goods into the Strip, increasing the amount of electricity we give it (what other country supplies her enemies?), and more. In return, they just have to stop trying to kill us.

This is apparently not good enough for our critics, who think there should be no blockade at all. Let the Gazans have all the pipes and cement they want. The critics should try living in Sderot or one of the smaller communities near Gaza.

Even historically, Israel looks pretty good. Yes, there was the nakba, in which between 500-700 thousand Arabs fled the 1948 War of Independence. A small number, particularly in villages that were hostile and fought alongside the troops from the Arab countries that had invaded our country, were actually kicked out. And after the war, we didn’t let them come back (had we done so, we would not have had a state). We still ended up with some 150,000 Arabs in our country, who ultimately got the right to vote. The Arabs who left for whatever reason were kept in camps by the Arab states, and they and their descendants made into perpetual refugees living under conditions of apartheid, by the Arab states and the cowardly UN. But as expiation for our guilt, we are expected – by the Palestinians and BDS supporters worldwide – to invite all 5 million of them to live in our country, thus ending it.

Should I mention that the Jordanians kicked out or killed every single Jew in the area that they conquered in 1948? That they broke the cease-fire agreement that called for all religious groups to be allowed to visit their holy sites? That some 800,000 Jews were forced to leave Arab countries, and most were absorbed by Israel? Now that’s ethnic cleansing. Let’s also not forget the genocidal threats made by Arab leaders in 1967.

I could go on, and on, and on. Israel has never committed genocide like the US or Germany, or mass murder like Russia. It has never nuked anyone, like the US. The number of Arabs living between the river and the sea has tripled since 1970. We have never had slavery. Our ratio of civilian to military deaths in urban warfare is the lowest in recent history. We use the “knock on the roof” technique and cellphone calls to warn civilians that a building will be bombed. We send soldiers in when artillery or air strikes would be safer for us. We do not engage in wars of conquest; indeed, we tend to (stupidly) give territory back to our defeated enemies.

Israel is a democracy, it is increasingly tolerant of alternative lifestyles, and increasingly intolerant of mistreatment of women. It does not persecute religious minorities. It has a relatively free press and permits free speech.

And yet, even our defenders find it necessary to insert a disclaimer.

Why? The Jewish people should be proud of its homeland, which has survived – and is surviving – repeated assaults from her neighbors, as well as viciously bigoted treatment from many other nations and institutions – while still doing a good job of maintaining freedom and protecting her citizens.

No, she isn’t perfect. No nation is. But don’t apologize; it’s not necessary, and anyway nothing short of national suicide will satisfy her critics.

The Yishai Fleisher Show: With the Satmar Zionists

First, Yishai returns from America and rejoins Rav Mike Feuer to discuss the Temple offerings brought by a woman after birth. Then - there are Satmar Hasidim who love the State of Israel and see it as the harbinger of the Third Temple! Hear Yishai's talk at their special synagogue in Williamsburg Brooklyn.

Unpleasant Laws

by HaRav Zalman Baruch Melamed
Rosh HaYeshiva, Beit El

Rabbi Shmuel Bar Yitchak once noted that certain laws of the Torah, even though they seem to be disgusting and therefore inappropriate to discuss in public, are "sweet to God." Some examples of this area of law: halachot governing impure emissions from the body, the menstrual impurity of a woman, etc. According to the prophet Malachi, "the offerings of Judea and Jerusalem will be sweet to Hashem as in former days..." is a reference to the Torah portions of the male and female who each have impure bodily emissions; they could have been written in one unit, but they were not. They were to be discussed, "savored" separately by God.

The laws of ritual purity and impurity, though they seem unpleasant, are a direct function of the greatness of the people of Israel. Only Israel, a nation mandated to continually rise to higher spiritual levels, is required to distance itself from impurity to such a great extent. Today, these Torah portions don’t speak to us so much. We cannot truly imagine what it must have been like to live in such a reality, with complex laws of purity and impurity governing our lives, what it must have involved to sacrifice the Pesach offering in purity. We lack a sense of Kedusha, or holiness. We do not have the Beit Hamikdash, the Torah-mandated holiness of the Teruma offering, etc. Thus, no laws of impurity are practically applicable. In the meantime, when we discuss matters of ritual purity and impurity, we "darshen" try to get a peek into the internal mechanisms of purity and impurity.

Tza'raat is the leprosy-like illness mentioned in our portion. Our sages explain that "Metzora," the Hebrew term for the person stricken with this illness, is an acronym for "Motzi Shem Ra" - someone who is a purveyor of slander against others. When we deal with Tz’araat, we discuss the mitzvah of guarding one’s tongue and the like. In other words, as opposed to studying the illness itself, we examine the factors that bring it about. All of the various types of impurity mentioned in this week’s Torah portion are impurities that emanate from, and become evident on, the surface of the human body. Only after a sore manifests itself in the case of Metzora - or blood in the case of a Zav or Zava, does the impurity appear - on the skin, clothing, vessels... Once the respective impurities appear the process of healing can begin. When the impurity manifests itself, it "escapes," and the person is freed from the turmoil that was brewing inside of him...

Speech also helps bring out that which was bound up inside the person. If talk is positive and productive, it brings in its wake all sorts of positive results. But, if God forbid, one speaks slanderously of another, one thereby emits all sorts of unhealthy forces that spread and impact on him as a person: on his skin, hair, clothing and home.

RAV KOOK'S ANALYSIS
Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak Kook of blessed Memory discusses three different levels on which man expresses his connection to money and material possessions: in reference to Tz’araat sores, in reference to our father Ya’akov and regarding the great sage, Rabbi Yochanan Ben Zakkai.

In reference to Tz’araat sores, our Torah portion says: "When you arrive in the Land of Cana’an that I will give you as an inheritance, and I will provide the blemish of Tz’araat in the homes of the Land of your inheritance." To this, the Tosefta responds: "There never was and never will be a home smitten with Tz’ara’at. If so why was it written? To teach you that it is a value to elucidate the law and thereby receive merit." All of the laws and sundry details were given so that we learn these mitzvot and thereby receive merit.

Rabbi Meir notes that in reference to the illness of Tzaraat, the Torah commands the Cohen, the Priest, to remove even minor clay vessels from the smitten home, lest they become defiled. He adds that the people generally smitten by the illness are those of a low moral stature, people who have been guilty of speaking slanderously and improperly. Therefore, concludes R. Meir, the Torah is concerned with even the most minor vessels of wicked people!

A similar theme is evident in the life of our forefather, Ya'akov. "And Ya’akov remained alone." Said R. Elazar: he remained back in order to collect small clay pottery. After Ya’akov had guided his family across the river, and even though only minor possessions were left back at the camp, he went back to get them. He would not even forfeit the smallest clay vessels...

This midrash is quite perplexing. Ya’akov Avinu, we are taught, remained alone because he went back to retrieve tiny clay jars? He seems to be a real miser! This aloneness, however, that characterized Ya’akov gives our forefather a quality otherwise reserved for God - Who is also "alone".
When Rabbi Yochanan Ben Zakkai fell ill, his students came to visit him. At the moment of his death, he said: Take the vessels out of this room due to the impurity [of my body once I am dead.] Prepare the throne for King Hezekiah the King of Judea..." Even if one can explain the eventual arrival of Hezekiah as preoccupying R. Yochanan before he dies, why should this great sage be worried about clay pottery and be worried that they be taken out of the building lest they be disposed of due to impurity?

Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak Kook offers an explanation as to the linkage between the above elements. We live in a world of separation, between light and darkness, Israel and the other nations, between the Shabbat day and the other days of the week. When the world was initially created, however, light and darkness were unified, and only thereafter are we told that God separated between light and darkness. In the future, the prophet Yeshaya tells us, the distinction between the light of the sun and the moon will disappear. In other words, at the foundation of all existence - all levels of the world are united. Only when they emanate into physical reality do they become divided; we thus experience darkness vs. light as well as various gradations of darkness vs. light. But in the future, these phenomenon will all unite. So, too, the distinction between Israel and the nations will become blurred, as the prophet Zephaniah teaches us: "Then, [says God], I will provide all of the nations with one mouth, to call in the name of God and to worship Him jointly".

ULTIMATE ONENESS
In the future, all days of the week will be melded into one grand day that is completely Shabbat. The mundane will unite with the holy, forging one united reality of holiness. The distinction between the holy and profane is not an intrinsic, absolute division; it came to the world as a result of the sin of the Garden of Eden, which resulted in a split between the physical and spiritual worlds. But when the world is ultimately rectified and perfected, when all creatures call out in the name of God, then these divisions will dissolve. In the meantime, the light must impact on the darkness, the holy on the mundane, Israel on the gentile nations, etc.

This unity is characteristic of our forefather Ya'akov. Ya'akov, like God, remained "alone." In the end of days, as well, God will be "alone," in that no other gods will be worshipped aside from Him. The clay jugs were important to Ya'akov not because he was miserly, God forbid, spending his time on trite matters, but because he saw the jugs as part of an entirety of existence, a reality that encompasses all things big and small. Clay jugs also have their purpose!

Rabbi Yochanan Ben Zakkai - before his encounter with the World to Come, mentioned the throne of King Hezekiah and called for the removal of vessels so that they would not be contaminated with the ritual impurity his dead body would create. At that moment, like Ya'akov our father, R. Yochanan understood the unity of all existence and the function of the most seemingly insignificant of objects:

Our sages teach that Hezekiah could have been the Mashiach, the Messiah; why then was he not allowed to be? Because he did not recite the Hallel on the great miracle that benefited him, when God killed in one night the entirety of the Ashur army. It was not Hezekiah, but the land, that then opened its mouth, so to speak, and sang. Rav Kook explains that although in Hezekiah’s day, Jews found themselves on a high level relative to both Torah study and spirituality in general, Hezekiah failed to translate that strength into an earthly holiness. It was not he who sang, but the earth itself that had to sing! Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai thus called for the preparation of a place for Hezekiah the King of Judea, as well as calling for the removal of vessels lest they become impure. These two approaches, though they represent opposite relationships and sensitivities to the fusion of physical and spiritual realities, are part of the same process. And R. Yochanan ben Zakkai understood that the process of redemption must engage and apply all matters, however contradictory...

The Kedusha Within

by Rav Meir Goldvicht

Our parasha opens with the laws of a yoledet (a woman who gives birth). As we go through the section discussing these laws, we find a passuk that commands us to perform the mitzvah of brit milah on the eighth day, from which Chazal learn that the brit milah must be performed by day, not by night, and that it is performed even if the eighth day falls on Shabbat. This raises the following question, asked by both the Chizkuni and the Ohr HaChaim: Why does the Torah interrupt the halachot of yoledet with a passuk discussing brit milah? This passuk seemingly belongs in parashat Lech Lecha with the rest of the halachot of brit milah, not here in the middle of the halachot of yoledet!

The Chizkuni and Ohr HaChaim suggest that we might have mistakenly thought that brit milah was performed on Shabbat only before kabbalat haTorah, but now that we have the mitzvah of Shabbat, the brit milah would be pushed to Sunday if the eighth day was Shabbat. This passuk therefore teaches us that even after kabbalat haTorah, brit milah on the eighth day trumps Shabbat. Although the answer of the Chizkuni and the Ohr HaChaim explains the necessity of this passuk, it doesn't seem to explain its seemingly incongruous placement in the middle of the section discussing yoledet! This, then, is our first question: What is the passuk of brit milah doing here in the middle of the parasha of yoledet?

The Torah goes on to obligate the yoledet to bring a korban chatat (a sin-offering). What exactly was the sin of the yoledet? The gemara in Niddah (31b) explains that the chatat is brought in order to atone for the woman's oath during childbirth never to give birth again because of the intense pain involved. The gemara's explanation is difficult to understand, however, because certainly not every yoledet, even with the great pain of childbirth, takes an oath to never again give birth! Yet the Torah obligates every yoledet to bring a korban chatat, not just those who take this oath. Our second question is: What sin did the yoledet commit that obligates her to bring a korban chatat?

To answer these questions we turn to the Ramban on sefer Bereishit. When HaKadosh Baruch Hu created the world, He regarded every aspect of the Creation as "ki tov, That it was good." The Ramban explains that ki tov means that Hashem desired that His handiwork last forever. The only thing HaKadosh Baruch Hu does not regard as ki tov at the time of its creation was Man. When HaKadosh Baruch Hu created Adam HaRishon, the Torah says, "vayyitzer, And He created," with two yuds. Rashi explains that one yud represents a yetzirah for this world and one yud represents a yetzirah for olam haba. In other words, when a person is born, it is unclear whether his creation was a good thing. As Iyov puts it, Man is born a wild animal" (11:12). Man is born a wild animal but must ripen into an Adam. If a person works on himself to be spiritually reborn, then he can be described as ki tov, for at that point HaKadosh Baruch Hu certainly desires that His handiwork last forever.

How does one achieve spiritual rebirth? The only way to accomplish this is to bring oneself to live a life of kedushah and taharah. Tumah comes into being wherever there is a termination of life or of the potential to create life. One who touches a live animal does not become tamei, but one who touches a dead animal does. Similarly, one who touches a live person does not become tamei, but one who comes into contact with a dead person does. This is also one of the explanations for tumat niddah—since potential for new life existed within the niddah, when this potential is terminated, tumah is created. In contrast, a pregnant woman does not have tumat niddah since she is actively involved in the creation of life.

In general, tumah arrives after a state of taharah or vice versa. Only at one time do tumah and taharah appear simultaneously—at the moment of birth. On the one hand, the baby represents taharah and new life. On the other hand, at that very moment the yoledet becomes t'meiah. The reason for this is that the baby has already begun to die, as it is one moment closer to its predestined time. (This is why Chazal refer to the womb as "קבר, grave" since it is not only the source of life, but the source of death as well.) The Ba'al HaTurim explains that this is in fact the reason the brit milah is on the eighth day of the child's life, since we must wait for the seven days of aveilut for the child to pass, as it were.

All of this is because of the sin of our great-grandmother, Chava, who ate from the eitz hada'at. This, then, is the reason why the yoledet brings a korban chatat—together all of the chata'ot will atone for the sin that brought death to the world and bring us back to eternal life. The way to fix the sin of our great-grandparents Adam and Chava is to strive for lives of kedushah and taharah.

This also explains why the mitzvah of brit milah appears in the middle of the parasha of yoledet—the brit milah reminds one of the kedushah within, through which we merit the ability to transform every nega (plague) into oneg (delight) and every tzara’at (leprosy) to atzeret (holiday). This ability comes about through the middah of anavah. The gemara in Erchin (16a) says that tzara'at afflicts a person because of ga'avah, lashon hara, and tzarut ayin (stinginess), all of which reflect the opposite of humility. The more we work on achieving anavah, the more we bring kedushah and taharah into our lives, and the closer we come to the fulfillment of the words of the navi, "And I will sprinkle pure waters upon you and purify you from all of your impurities..." (Yechezkel 36:25).

This Shabbat, which is both Shabbat HaChodesh and Shabbat Mevorchim for the month of Nissan, is a unique opportunity to begin our spiritual lives anew, imbuing our lives with kedushah and taharah, and preparing ourselves to receive the light of the Geulah.

The Mitsva of Circumcision

by Rabbi Dov Berl Wein
From the time of our father Avraham, circumcision has been the cornerstone of Jewish identity. We acknowledge this in our prayer after meals daily "we are grateful to You for your covenant that you have sealed into our flesh." The rabbis of the Talmud indicated to us that the Jewish people accepted this commandment of circumcision willingly and happily and therefore it has persisted amongst Israel uninterruptedly for all of these many generations since the time of Avraham. Though many claims of physical health benefits have been made over time for the efficacy of this procedure, the Jewish people have always viewed it as being the supreme symbol of personal Jewish identity and role. Over the ages the enemies of the Jewish people have attempted at various times to ban Jewish circumcision. The great classical Greeks considered it to be a mutilation of the body and in that body worshipping culture it was held to be repugnant and unacceptable. Much more recently the "progressive, democratic, peace-loving" Soviet Union prevented Jewish circumcision. In all cases, from Antiochus to Gorbachev, there were Jews who risked all to fulfill the commandment of circumcision. However, it bears note that the enemies of the Jews saw in Jewish circumcision a spiritual weapon of the Jews that would help guarantee their survival against the prevailing government, mores and culture. As is often the case our enemies are more astute in recognizing and identifying the true strength points of the Jews than many Jews are themselves.

The commandment of circumcision is that the procedure is to take place on the eighth day of the young boy’s life. There are physical circumstances that can allow for a postponement of the actual circumcision but the obligation of circumcision remains a personal obligatory one upon the Jew throughout life. For instance the Talmud records that a person who is a hemophiliac obviously should not undergo a then life-threatening procedure such as circumcision. However, even though that person has more than a legitimate excuse for remaining uncircumcised he still is considered to be uncircumcised according to halacha and therefore excluded from those rituals that the Torah explicitly requires that only circumcised Jews may participate in. This is a further indication of the stress and importance that the Torah places upon this commandment and how vital it is to the Jewish being and future. It is therefore most understandable why the performance of this commandment occasions the necessity for a festive meal and a great gathering of friends and family. It is not only the circumcision of that actual child that is being celebrated as much as it is a celebration of the ceremony itself, an affirmation of Jewish tradition and identity that is millennia old. Over the centuries, Jews have paid with their lives for being circumcised but the ceremony itself is seen as an affirmation of life and holy commitment. Physical health benefits have been ascribed to the procedure and its result. But Jews perform this commandment out of belief and joy and conscience and not out of any other considerations.

The Place of Tumah in the Human Experience

by HaRav Shaul Israeli, ZT"L

Sefer Vayikra through Parashat Shemini deals with a description of the divine service and the inauguration of the Mishkan. Parashat Acharei Mot contains a detailed account of the service of Yom Kippur. In our two parshiyot, Tazria and Metzora, a different topic "interrupts": the various causes of tumah (ritual impurity) that affect man. These can be broken into two categories: those that affect men or women without being a response to wrongdoing, such as tumot related to the reproductive cycle; those that can be attributed to man’s wrongdoing, i.e., tzara’at afflicting the body, garments, or structures.

Rashi (Vayikra 12:2) tells us that the laws of man are specified after those of animals, just as man was created after animals. Man, unlike animals, wavers greatly between greatness and lowliness. "If he has merit, he precedes the ministering angels; if he lacks merit, a mosquito precedes him" (Bereisheet Rabba 8:1). Since creation was made with man in mind, he has a great obligation to improve the world and not spoil it. He has two opposite sides: he is made of earth and has the spirit of life that Hashem breathed into him. Man stands between his animalistic side and his divine side, between impurity and sanctity. Both elements follow him throughout his life; he should not be naïve and ignore the danger that lurks around his spiritual state.

A child is born, and at the same time there is tumah (Vayikra 12:2). On the eighth day, a Jewish baby boy is circumcised (ibid. 3). Only a baby whose mother has tumah at birth can have his brit on the eighth day even on Shabbat. The connection is that the brit mila is made to fight tumah, for if man does not fight the tumah, it will overtake him spiritually and he will be liable and deserving of the various forms of tzara’at.

Hashem acknowledges that He created evil and attached it to man (see Micha 4:6; Berachot 32a). But it was created so that we should fight and overcome it. We use special "spices" such as Torah (Kiddushin 30b), thus called because like spices change a food’s taste, so Torah turns a person from bad to good.

Sometimes a person errs by being too far away from Hashem, and sometimes he sins by approaching Hashem in the wrong way (see Vayikra 16:1). The latter can come out of arrogance of a type that can lead to lashon hara and tzara’at. Tzara’at comes to signal man about his problem. Fortunate is the one who responds properly to the sign. On a national level as well, there are forces of good and of bad: when one goes up, the other goes down (Megilla 6a).

Why do we tell man that if he is successful, he is greater than the angels? For a similar reason that we tell him he could be lowlier than a fly. Lack of recognition of the dangers in both directions need to be countered. Therefore, we should tell the "Levites" of all generations, i.e., Torah scholars in our times, the power they possess and what they need to do. In such a confusing world, we need to concentrate on logic and a clear head and win the battle over the direction of our lives.

The Nation-State Law under attack

by Victor Rosenthal

Amos Schocken is the publisher of Ha’aretz, the employer of Gideon Levy and Amira Hass, of Rogel Alpher and B. Michael, and other writers who pour out their hatred of the Jewish state both in Hebrew and English translation. To someone like me who believes that the battle to defend Israel in the information sphere is as important as the kinetic conflict on the battlefields, Amos Schocken is the devil.

Schocken and the rest of the Israeli Left passionately hate the recently passed Nation-State Law. To them, the statement that “Israel is the nation-state of the Jewish people” is anathema. It is a statement of Zionism, which is Jewish nationalism. And they don’t care very much for either nationalism (except perhaps Palestinian nationalism) or anything connected with Jewishness. In fact, I suspect that they don’t care much for Jews either; but that’s another blog.

For those who don’t know, Israel does not have a constitution as such. When the state was declared in May 1948, there was no time to create one in the midst of a war. The Declaration of Independence optimistically set a date five months in the future at which a constitution would be adopted. But the differences of opinion about the nature of the state, between religious and secular, socialist and capitalist, were so great that it was – and still is – impossible to develop a comprehensive document that everyone can agree on. Instead, it was decided on an incremental approach: to pass a series of Basic Laws that, taken together, would fully define the state. This task is still incomplete.

The Declaration of Independence refers to the state that is coming into existence as a “Jewish state,” asserts “the natural right of the Jewish people to be masters of their own fate, like all other nations, in their own sovereign State” [my italics] and adds that

The State of Israel will be open for Jewish immigration and for the Ingathering of the Exiles; it will foster the development of the country for the benefit of all its inhabitants; it will be based on freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of Israel; it will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture; it will safeguard the Holy Places of all religions; and it will be faithful to the principles of the Charter of the United Nations.

Since then, several Basic Laws have been passed that define how all the citizens of the state can exercise their rights to vote and hold office. There are also a Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty, and a Basic Law: Freedom of Occupation, which have been very broadly interpreted by the courts to guarantee many other rights and freedoms to all Israeli citizens.

These laws contains the formulation “Jewish and democratic state” which, while it doesn’t occur verbatim in the Declaration of Independence, is generally considered to be an accurate description of what the founders had in mind for the nature of the state. The problem is that it is not at all clear what “Jewish” means in this context.

It is pretty clear what “democratic” means: there will be a democratic process for determining the nation’s policies and choosing its leaders, there will be democratic institutions, a rule of law, and citizens will have equal “social and political rights.”

But “Jewish” could mean anything between a state whose laws are identical with Jewish law (a halachic state) to a state with a Jewish majority but no other special features. Nevertheless, it is clear that the founders intended more than just the latter when they said “their own sovereign state.”

There have been pressures from some non-Jewish citizens and left-wing Jews like Schocken to redefine the state as “a state of all its citizens.” Some want to eliminate all specifically Jewish content from the symbols of the state like the flag and the national anthem, and repeal the Law of Return for Jews. In response to this, the Knesset considered – for a period of years – and finally passed, the Basic Law: Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People, which explicates the meaning of “Jewish state.” The most important part of it is this:

• The State of Israel is the nation state of the Jewish People, in which it realizes its natural, cultural, religious and historical right to self-determination.
• The exercise of the right to national self-determination in the State of Israel is unique to the Jewish People.

Amos Schocken would like to see the law overthrown by Israel’s Supreme Court. He asserts that the Court has the power to do this, even though the law itself, as a Basic Law, has constitutional force. This is because of a clause inserted in two basic laws passed in 1992, which can be interpreted as making the Declaration of Independence a “fundamental principle” or source of “supreme values” against which all laws – even constitution-like Basic Laws – can be measured.

This assumption presents significant problems. The Declaration of Independence wasn’t intended to be a constitution, as shown by the provision it contains that a constitution for the new state be adopted within five months. And anyway, even if the Court’s authority to annul a Basic Law on the basis of the Declaration of Independence were granted, the whole issue rests on the interpretation of terms (e.g., “Jewish State”) that are used but not defined in the Declaration.

Schocken argues that the Declaration promises Arabs full “social and political” rights. And he is correct. But then he conflates these rights with the right to a national home in Israel for Palestinian Arabs, which it clearly does not grant them. He writes:

How is this [the Nation-State Law] at all conceivable given the explicit statement in the Declaration of Independence that Israel “will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex”? The nation-state law clearly cannot be reconciled with the value of equality as stated in the Declaration.

Of course it can be reconciled, if we maintain the distinction between “social and political” rights – what Americans might call “civil rights” – and “national rights,” including the “right to national self-determination” asserted in the Nation-State Law.

So what are these national rights guaranteed by the new law? Some are “only” symbolic, like the flag, the national anthem, the symbol of the state, holidays, and so on. But some are supremely practical and a matter of life and death: the Law of Return for Jews and the commitment to encourage the ingathering of exiles, Jews from around the world. These rights are what make it possible for Israel to be a place of refuge for persecuted Jews everywhere; the victims of the Nazis, the Jews expelled from Muslim countries, the Soviet Jews, and the growing number of Jews fleeing from violent antisemitism in Europe.

Those who oppose the Nation-State Law say that it takes away rights from non-Jews. But the only “right” it reserves to the Jews is the right to self-determination in their national home, Israel. And this is not a right we wish to grant to anyone else.

In truth, it isn’t a question of democracy. Schocken and his friends are embarrassed by the fact that Israel is still an ethnic nation-state as its founders intended, and they want it to follow the model of European and North American democracies and become a “state of all its citizens.” The Israeli Arab intellectuals who wrote the “Future Vision” document several years ago go farther, and say that they want it to become a binational state, with “Palestinian Arabs” (they define themselves as an “inseparable part of the Palestinian people”) having an equal role with the Jewish majority in the state’s decision-making. Indeed, they also demand a right of return for Arab “refugees,” so even the Jewish majority would be short-lived.

There is good reason to worry, from past behavior, that Israel’s left-leaning Supreme Court will adopt the view that it can adjudicate Basic Laws as Schocken describes, and go on to invalidate the Nation-State Law on spurious grounds. This would create a constitutional crisis that would set the Court directly against the majority of the Knesset, the PM and cabinet, and the majority of Israeli citizens. Most likely the Court would lose, and end up with its power severely circumscribed – and its reputation even worse than it is now. I believe that only the imminence of the election keeps this from erupting now.

An alternative would be for the legal establishment, the Justice Minister (who I hope will be Ayelet Shaked again after the election), and the Knesset to work together to formalize the relationship of the Court to the rest of the government, and clearly define its areas of jurisdiction and the limits of its power.

That would be the adult way to handle it. We’ll find out after the election if our leaders are capable of behaving like adults.

The Controversy over Tiny Insects

by HaRav Eliezer Melamed
Rosh HaYeshiva, Har Bracha
The prevailing definition that it is permissible to eat an insect that cannot be seen by the human eye is not sufficient to determine halakha, since eyesight depends on many factors * The halachic authorities throughout the generations did not require certain fruits and vegetables, in which a fear of small insects exists, to be examined in special ways and conditions, as required by today’s stringent halachic authorities * Halachic authorities throughout the generations dealt with issues involving larger insects * In terms of preserving tradition, it is preferable not to require more rigorous examinations than in the past, however, from the perspective of emerging reality, there is room to say that due to technology, today we are more aware of tiny insects

The Question of Tiny Insects

In my previous column, I summed up the halakha regarding the obligation to examine flour and sift it, in the past and today. In order to understand the entire scope of the prohibition of shratzim (worms and insects) and the extent to which one must make an effort to check food for them, it is necessary to explain the basic dispute regarding tiny insects.

Ordinary Torah students think that the law of tiny shratzim is simple: what a person can see is forbidden, and what he cannot see with his naked eyes, but only with the help of a magnifying glass or a microscope, is permitted. This is indeed what several Achronin wrote (Binat Adam 34:49; Aruch HaShulchan 84:36; Igrot Moshe, Y.D. 2:146; Yibeah Omer 4, Y.D., 21). According to this, presumably, one needs to know how small an object a person can see, and in view of that, determine the halakha. However, this definition is not sufficient, because eyesight varies from person to person, and also depends on the color of the insect and the background on which it is situated. A person with good eyesight can see on a white background, large black bacteria the size of five hundred millimeters, however, when the color of the insect is similar to the background on which it is situated, even if it is ten times larger, one will not be able to see it, and only laboratory workers will possibly be able to see it. People with good eyesight cannot always detect even a two-millimeter insect, however, when pointed at, they are able to see it. In other words, seeing the tiny insect depends on several factors: a) its size, b) the quality of one’s eyesight, c) the color of the sheretz (insect) and its background, d) recognition of shratzim, and e) how it is situated, for if it is crawling, it is easier to be seen.

The Strict Opinion

Some poskim (halachic authorities) are of the opinion that when it comes to a vegetable or fruit that is known to have shratzim, one is obligated to check after every sheretz that can be seen under optimal conditions. When it is difficult to check under normal conditions, the advice of an expert should be sought, or an illuminated table should be used, etc., and only after it is clear there is absolutely no sheretz, is it permitted to be eaten, but if it cannot be checked properly, it is forbidden to be eaten it. Consequently, the machmirim (strict poskim) instructed not to eat corn-on-the-cob, cauliflower, broccoli, and strawberries, which cannot be checked for tiny insects. They also wrote books to define the condition of each species of food, the shratzim they contain, and how they must be checked (the series of Rav Vayah’s books, “Bedikat Ha’mazone K’Halakha,” and Rabbi Revach’s series of books “To’lat Shani”).

A possible source of the machmirim’s opinion is that of the Laniado rabbis from Aleppo, who forbade eating grape leaves because of the tiny worms found in them, and other poskim who warned against small shratzim (Maharam ben Haviv in Responsa Kol Gadol 5, concerning worms in vinegar; Pri Chadash, 84, who instructed to check infested leaves against the sun; Chida, Y.D. 84:24; Shlah, Shaar Ha’Oti’ot, Kedushat Ha’Achila 18, that those who check should have good eyesight; Ben Ish Chai, Parshat Tzav, 27, who warned not to eat lettuce leaves because they contain numerous shratzim).

Disputing the Sources of the Strict Poskim

Although it is clear that some of the Achronim were machmir regarding tiny shratzim, it seems they were not as stringent as today’s poskim, since their warnings apparently referred to larger insects, and vegetables that had much more shratzim.

An example of this can be found in the way they learned from words of the Chatam Sofer and Mishna Berura (473: 42), who wrote: ” During the days of Pesach, there are a lot of very small worms that are not visible to those with weak eyesight, therefore, whoever does not have God-fearing people with good eyesight who can check properly, it is preferable to use tamcha (chrain).” The machmirim learned from this an absolute prohibition. However, the Chatam Sofer and the Mishna Berura were precise in their words, calling for God-fearing people who do not have weak eyesight to check the lettuce, but they did not decide that without this, there is an absolute prohibition.

In addition, apparently those God-fearing people with good eyesight did not find all the shratzim that the machmirim find today. This is proven in regards to flour, which today’s machmirim require be sifted in a sieve of 70 Mesh (70 hole per inch), whereas until about fifty years ago, observant Jews did not own such sieves, and all the God-fearing men and women would sift flour in regular sieves (about 30 Mesh), thus in practice, they were unable to sift these tiny shratzim from flour. Not only that, but until recent generations, they used whole wheat flour, whose particles are known to be larger, and do not pass in a 70 Mesh sieve.

The Lenient Opinion

In the opinion of the matir’im ( lenient poskim), halakha is determined according to people’s actual eyesight, and there is no prohibition against eating fruit or vegetables that contain tiny insects that people with good eyesight do not see in ordinary vision. This is because the Torah was not given to ministering angels, but to human beings, and human beings cannot discern tiny vermin, and as we find throughout the Torah that in all cases we go according to what people actually observe. This was the custom of the majority of Jews and the Gedolei Yisrael, who were not meticulous to check food as today’s machmirim instruct.

Although they did not write this explicitly, it is proven from the Talmud, Rishonim, Rambam, and the Shulchan Arukh, who did not elaborate on the laws of checking shratzim for every vegetable or fruit in a detailed manner, as it should have been if it is indeed an obligation intended to prevent a Torah or rabbinic prohibition. They also did not prescribe necessary instructions for checking shratzim, such as adults over the age of fifty should not be relied on to check since they are unable to see the tiny bugs, and to be meticulous to check the vermin against a contrasting background color. And all the poskim should have written in their books that the examination should be done in the sun, and not in houses which were poorly lit for the windows were small. They also did not demand that experts deal with checking the bugs, but rather relied on anyone’s checking, whether it be a man or a woman, young or old. Only someone who found a chomet (a small lizard according to Rav Saadia Gaon, or a snail according to Rashi) in food he checked loses its chazaka (presumption of not being infested), because it is clearly seen with one’s naked eye (S. A., 84:11).

Indirect Evidence

The poskim did not have to write this explicitly, because this was known through tradition. Therefore, evidence can be presented only from their overall words, such as the fact that most of the halakhic discussions regard large shratzim, as opposed to the tiny vermin that the machmirim are meticulous about. It is also proven from the words of the machmirim who complained about the people who do not check suitably, and about the rabbis who do not adequately teach to check properly.

Among those inclined to be lenient: Rabbi Feinstein in ‘Igrot Moshe’ Yoreh Deah 4: 2; Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach in ‘Minchat Shlomo’ 2:61; Rav Kasar in “HaChaim v’ HaShalom” Yoreh Deah 16; Rabbi Nachum Rabinovitch in ‘Siach Nachum’ 45; Rav Amar in ‘Shema Shlomo’ Volume 7, Yoreh Deah 4.

The Logic of the Machmirim

It seems that if the machmirim claim that they are observant of the masoret (tradition), and out of absolute loyalty to the words of the poskim they rule as they do, their opinion must be rejected. On the contrary, it is precisely for this reason that it is incorrect to be machmir, so as not call into question the minhag (custom) of earlier generations.

However there is another strong claim in their words, namely, that as a result of modernity, our awareness has also changed. In other words, the development of modern research methods and measurement tools have increased our awareness of the presence of tiny vermin in vegetables and foods and have created a change in the law, that today we should also be concerned about tiny vermin, more than in the past. In addition, science and technology development has provided us with additional tools to clean food from tiny insects, and to grow vegetables clean of tiny shratzim, and when possible, one is obligated to use them.

The Halachic Decision Goes According to the Lenient Poskim

After we have learned that in practice, the poskim have two different methods, it is necessary to decide which one to follow. According to the rules of halakha, the decision should follow the lenient opinion, i.e., it is not necessary to check for tiny shratzim that human beings do not see with the naked eye. There are five core foundations for this, and on the basis of each one of them, it is possible to decide according to the opinion of the lenient poskim, all the more so when all of the foundations apply. Every foundation is an issue in itself, and at the present, I am only able to headline each one of them:

1) The discussion is of a prohibition from Divrei Chachamim (rabbinic status), since from the Torah, as long as one does not taste the shratzim they are batel (nullified) in the food in which they are found. Only our Sages were machmir and decided that a beriah (whole organism) aina batel b’elef (is not nullified by a one to a thousand ratio), and therefore when there is disagreement over whether to check for tiny shratzim, halakha should be determined according to the lenient opinion.

2) Even if we go according to the opinion of the machmirim that one must check for tiny shratzim, in the opinion of some of the leading Rishonim (Rashba, Rosh, and Or Zarua), they are nullified by one in a thousand, for what our Sages were machmir about, is that a beriah should not be batel b’shishim (nullified in a one to sixty ratio), but in close to a thousand, it is batel. And some of the greatest Achronim wrote that when necessary, one can rely on them. All the more so when we are dealing with tiny and disgusting shratzim that have no importance.

3) Since there is disagreement over the status of tiny shratzim, in terms of the definition of “miut ha’matzuy” (a substantial minority), halakha should be instructed according to the lenient opinions, and in any case, usually there are no shratzim at the measurement of ‘miut ha’matzuy‘, and it is not necessary to check for them, because we go according to the rov (majority).

4) It is reasonable to assume that a Torah prohibition of eating cannot apply to a food that when eaten alone, its taste, or its ingestion, cannot be discerned. In practice, it is impossible to discern the taste and ingestion of most of the tiny shratzim, such as thrips and aphids. However, it seems that a person who sees them, but nevertheless eats them, transgresses a rabbinical prohibition. But as long as one did not see them, he has not transgressed a prohibition.

5) Even if the sheretz is a little bit larger, such that if one eats it alone, and concentrates on what he is eating, is able to discern its taste and ingestion and consequently transgresses a Torah prohibition, when eating some other type of food, and unknowingly it might possibly contain a sheretz whose taste cannot be discerned, in the opinion of numerous poskim, he has not transgressed a prohibition, for in every bite he eats, he does not know if he has also eaten a sheretz, and consequently, this is similar to a d’var she’aino mitkaven (something unintentional).

Although all of these foundations indicate that in practice, the halakha should be decided according to the lenient opinion, nevertheless, the opinion of the machmirim is not nullified. Consequently, this issue has three different approaches: lenient, strict, and in the middle, as I will explain, God-willing, next week.

The Shamrak Report: Terrorising Israel with Impunity and more...

“Hamas doesn’t want a large-scale military confrontation” is Israeli officials’ favorite term to explain why no major IDF offensive is launched to stop the terrorist plague unleashed from Gaza year after year. Of course, Hamas doesn’t; its style is terror, not full-scale combat. The ongoing Egyptian mediation is thus sidetracked into a bid to prevent Israel from launching a major war, while allowing the Palestinian Hamas to carry on with its highly successful terror-cum-extortion strategy.

Another pet Israeli phrase is that “Hamas needs to gain the profile of a victor.” The Palestinian terrorist group has, however, gained the full-face image of a victor. A panoramic view of the array of Israeli forces, tanks and equipment massed around Gaza by one of the foremost world armies to challenge a small terrorist group, fully justifies Hamas in showing the V sign.

As if to demonstrate that it is business as usual, terrorists hurled firebombs and hand grenades from Gaza at Israel’s border troops for five hours on Friday night, March 29, double its usual strength, whereas the IDF sent a single tank to fire three shells at a lone Hamas position. Saturday midday, the first firebombs of the day were aimed at Israel soldiers...

There are more phrases for excusing Israel’s reluctance to deal with the Palestinian terrorists ruling the Gaza Strip root and branch. One contention is that Hamas is a hopeless case unless Israel re-occupies the Gaza Strip which Israel turned over to Palestinian rule in 2005 and this, no one wants. This contention too betokens the absence of original thinking for which the IDF used to be celebrated.

The incumbent Chief of Staff, Lt. Gen. Aviv Kochavi would undoubtedly hope no one remembers his words on September 12, 2007, after the last Israel soldier and all 8,000 civilians had departed the Gaza Strip for good.

As commander of the Gaza Division, he shut the Kissufim border crossing gate for the last time and declared: “If the Palestinians now fire a single bullet, the IDF will return to the Strip.”

...It has reached a point where nothing but fundamental action will suffice for recovering Israel’s deterrent strength, say DEBKAfile’s military sources: Either 1. A large-scale IDF operation for eliminating Hamas leaders and commanders and destroying their Ezz-e-din Qassam armed wing; or 2. A joint-Egyptian military campaign with the same object. Either way, Hamas rule of the Gaza Strip must be wiped out. Halting the operation in the middle for fear of international denigration, like the last campaign four years ago, would totally defeat the purpose... (Elimination of Hamas leaders is useless – it will only bring new ones and unleash more terror, as they will need to ‘prove’ themselves – “to gain the profile of a victor.”Removal of enemy population, which support terror against Israel, from Gaza is the only way to end terror attacks from Gaza!)

Food for Thought. by Steven Shamrak

Jews and our leadership must stop caring what anti-Semitic idiots think about us! More important what opinion we - Jews - have about ourselves. Many of us, including community leaders and Israeli political leadership – many of whom are Jew-haters, are still have deeply ingrained ‘Ghetto mentality’ mindset -- self-hating tendency with the pathological need for appeasement of others and approval from others. Only by regaining self respect, setting and implementing our own national goals we will obtain respect of others, even from anti-Semites!

Sinai Option - Road to Permanent Peace!

Please, read and forward this article!

Israel's 'Quiet' Time - 501 Terror Attacks!

A total of 55 terrorist attacks were recorded across Israel over the past week, bringing the total number of attacks in 2019 to 501.

Arab Israelis are Enemies Within!

Israeli Arab students held a moment of silence at the Tel-Aviv University for the “martyrs” in Gaza following the recent escalation that saw terrorist rocket attacks on Israeli civilian targets. The students gathered in the university’s Entin Square, waving the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) flag and holding signs reading “one nation, one will, one struggle”. (There are still delusional people who believe that educating Arabs will end terror and bring peace to Israel. More likely education will make them more prolific terrorists, like 9/11 hijackers!)

Relentless 'Ugly Nazi'

The United States came under sharp criticism from the 14 other Security Council nations for its decision to recognize Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights in violation of council resolutions. (When will the US stop financing this den of hate?)

Enemy of Israel always Refer to non-Existing Laws

The government of Saudi Arabia (as well as Lebanon, Russia etc...) has formally condemned the US over the decision to recognize the Golan Heights as Israeli territory, claiming the move violates international law. Israeli first captured the Golan Heights from Syria in 1967, after the strategic plateau had been used by to attack Israeli towns in the nearby Galilee.(The Golan Heights were part of the original Palestinian mandate, designated for the future Jewish state, and Israel has reclaimed it in a defensive war. On both accounts, not even counting biblical one, the Golan Heights are legally part of Israel. Our enemies have never bothered to quote the actual law that has been broken by Israel or by our friends! And, in moments like that, they all are so concerned with non-existent peace process!)

Democrats Shifted Away from Israel to Anti-Semitism

Freshman Rep. Ilhan Omar’s (D-Minn.) recent comments criticizing US support for Israel have caused a rift in the Democratic Party. A poll shows Democrats are newly split on their sympathies between the Israelis and the Palestinians. While 27 percent of Democrats said they sympathized more with the Israelis, 26 percent sided more with the Palestinians. Back in January 2017, Democrats were much more tilted toward the Israelis, 42 percent to 23 percent.

A ‘Ceasefire’ was Celebrated with Rockets Fire

More than 60 rockets were fired at Israel’s south overnight last Tuesday from the Gaza Strip, despite an Egyptian-brokered ceasefire. Hamas said it had accepted the ceasefire called for 10pm. However, rockets continued to pummel Israel well into the night.

Quote of the Week:

“There is a very important principle in international life: When you start wars of aggression, you lose territory; do not come and claim it afterwards. It belongs to us.” -Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, referring to the 1967 Six Day War acquisition of territory by Israel. - This is the rule of a (defensive) war! Until now, all, including Israeli politicians, deliberately ignored it! Bibi knows this and other international laws that support Israel’s rights, but deliberately does nothing to end enemy terror against Jews in Israel; remove enemies from Jewish land; and reunite Eretz-Israel!

Israel Needs Self-Respectful Zionist Leadership!

Another burst of five Hamas rockets, yet Israel reopens Gaza crossings, releases $300m payout!

Israel reopened the Gaza border crossings early Sunday March 31, although five Palestinian rockets were aimed at the Eshkol district. IDF tanks hit back at (empty) Hamas positions in northern and central Gaza.

The usual terrorist and IDF tit-for-tat show goes on – and Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar pledged more of the same.

The UN beginning to draw on the $300m fund for Gaza Strip’s economic development accumulated from donations by different countries. Expenditure on projects will be overseen by Nickolay Mladenov, UN Special Coordinator for Middle East Peace Process.

Generous Israeli benefits and Hamas promises make up a new understanding for which the Egyptian mediators are now working on a timetable:

1.    Expansion of the flow of food supplies crossing into the Gaza Strip as well as building materials, which Israel restricted in the past as they were used for terror tunnels.

2.    Discussions on a maritime line linking Gaza to a port in Cyprus or Egypt.

3.    Hamas will halt its attacks on IDF forces defending the border fence.

4.    Palestinian rocket fire against Israel will cease.

5.    No more explosive balloon assaults.

6.    The IDF will exercise restraint against Palestinian “demonstrators” pushing against the border fence. This is taken to mean an end to live fire.

7.    Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia will twist the arm of Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas to release the funds he has been holding back from the Hamas regime for covering its payroll and Gaza’s electricity bills.

8.    A permanent Egyptian mission will be established in Gaza City to monitor the new accord’s implementation. Its members, high-ranking Egyptian intelligence officers, were present on the ground during the Saturday demonstration.

9.    No truce will be announced between Israel and Hamas. At a later date, they will announce that they are reverting to the understandings reached after Defensive Shield, Israel’s last major counter-terror operation in Gaza in 2006.