Home Home / Rethinking the Jewish Position on Relig…

Speech

November 17, 1962

Rethinking the Jewish Position on Religion-State Problems: A Descending View (1962)

Religion & State
View The Text

This content is currently available in its original PDF format. As we expand the library, we plan to add a text version as well.

RELATED CONTENT

Article

The Jewish State: The Next Fifty Years (1999)

I proceed on the premise that Israel should be a Jewish state and not merely a state of the Jews. This assumption is no longer self-understood. Thus, there has been much talk recently, especially by some leftist intellectuals, about radically changing the emerging collective character of the state to make it thoroughly secularist by, among other things, doing away with “Hatikva,” abolishing the Law of Return, abrogating all “religious legislation,” and disestablishing the official rabbinate—all this as befitting the new “post-Zionist” period.Let us put the problem in biblical perspective. The Tora speaks of God’s three covenants: With Noah, with Abraham and with Moses. The first was the covenant with humanity at large—the universal dimension of Judaism. The second was with Abraham and his posterity. Here the Almighty promised to be the God of the Children of Abraham and vouchsafed to them their perpetuity as a people, and the Land of Israel. The third was the Tora itself—the full range of religious obligations and spiritual privileges incumbent upon Jews by virtue of their birth into the people of Israel. It is understood that each successive covenant included that which preceded it. Thus, to be a Jew in the fullest sense, one must be committed not only to the laws of the Tora but, as well, to Israel—people and land—and to all humanity, as part of the unique covenantal commitment to the Creator.From this point of view, a Jew who lives ethically and morally, but is divorced from the Jewish community and the Land of Israel, is a good human being but a poor Jew. One who adds to this his national-ethnic loyalties as a Jew is still an incomplete Jew. And one who observes the commandments but fails to identify with his people and homeland, or is delinquent as a moral human being—is doing the unthinkable. Such a Jew, who observes the covenant of Moses but betrays his obligations under the national and the universal covenants, is living a contradiction.Complications, howev…
Zionism Religion & State

Correspondence

Exchange with R. Jakobovits about Political Involvement in "Who Is a Jew" Issue (1974)

Dear Norman, Thank you so much for your letter and enclosures which I read with special interest. The sermons, though in the nature of things somewhat depressing, show your usual mastery of thought, analysis, expression and homiletics. They mirror an assessment of the American reaction to the War rather different from what I have observed in the Anglo-Jewish community, where indifference, let alone hostility, were very little in evidence. I felt the contrast myself when I briefly visited America for the marriage of our son in Detroit at the time of the cease-fire. I am now looking forward with particularly eager anticipation to your contribution at the Hebrew University Conference. This must have been quite a fascinating and stimulating experience. On the Mafdal front, our discussion has been overtaken by events culminating in the, to my mind, rather humiliating capitulation of its ill-advised stand. The whole episode reeks with inconsistency, short-sightedness and sheer folly. I am enclosing a statement I circulated among my colleagues which will indicate my position, lonely and subject to no end of abusive attacks as it was. From all the evidence I have, your information on the Rav’s attitude is not altogether accurate. My information from Fabian and other sources is that, presumably capitulating to the agitation fanned by Lubavitch, he took the initiative in pressing Goren to forbid the Mafdal to join the coalition – a decision which may, I fear, be rued for years to come. I also gather, contrary to what you write, that Yosef, far from threatening to fall out with Goren over his refusal to countenance the Mafdal’s joining the Government, in fact adopted the far more reasonable attitude of leaving the political decision to the party itself. As I intimate in my statement, I believe the solution now lies in taking the whole issue out of the political arena and placing it into the hands of the Rabbinate where it properly belongs. In alluding to the proposal you men…
Religion & State Who Is a Jew?

Correspondence

Letter from R. Jakobovits about His Concerns Concerning Religion and Politics in Israel (1974)

Dear Norman, I am turning to you, amongst a select number of leading personalities in Israel, to seek your advice, and possibly your assistance, in an effort to make some contribution towards alleviating the grave crisis afflicting our people in the wake of the Yom Kippur War. Even greater than the threat to Israel’s security from the might and machinations of our enemies from without is the mortal danger from within of disunity and disintegration, sapping Israel’s inner strength, resolve and morale. To Jews with a historical awareness, the present fragmentation and bitter strife in Government, inside the political parties and even in the Rabbinate cannot but be ominously reminiscent of the "Sinat hinam" which, as our Sages invariably maintained, caused the destruction of Jerusalem 1900 years ago.I have urged, both publicly and in private discussions - at any rate during the present emergency when religious faith and national unity are suoh indispensable assets to Jewish survival - that we shift the emphasis in our spiritual confrontations and challenges from legislation to education. Hore specifically, I suggest that 1) secularists be persuaded to admit some regular religious education and religious experience in all schools in Israel and 2) a moratorium be called on all new legislation of religious significance, such as conversions, civil marriage, public Shabbat observance and autopsies.At the root of our perilous predicament, to my mind, is a profound spiritual erisis revealed and accentuated by the Yom Kippur War. Israeli society is being acutely polarised and, worse still, demoralised by ever more bitter divisions on the very ideals which have sustained the spirit of our nation and united us in all our past tribulations.We are now paying a fearful price for the lack of a spiritual faith amongst 30 many of Israel's children. The rigid demarcation in the State system between religious schools for only a minority and non-religious schools for the rest, has raise…
Religion & State