Yeshiva University is exceedingly proud of its alumni, both men and women, in Israel: their idealism, their personal deportment, their families, their professional achievements, and their varied contributions to the State of Israel. I have met our graduates in every part of this country and they are engaged in a dizzying variety of professions and businesses. In all cases, they have given us cause for pride and “nachas.”But these accomplishments are, for the most part, personal, the result of individual efforts and successes. What has been missing is the collective voice of the Yeshiva University graduates in the State of Israel.The time has come for Yeshiva University, through its alumni, to become a clear and articulate moral force in this country. Our alumni must become a cohesive group united not only by a common alma mater, but by a comprehensive Torah outlook which, without keeping to any party line, will be idealistic yet realistic, both youthfully energetic and mature, assertive but balanced, and combining enthu­siasm with sanity.A wave of extremism is sweeping the world, and America and the American Jewish com­munity have not remained unaffected by it. But the negative results are far more palpable and consequential in Israel for a number of obvious reasons: it is a smaller country; this is a highly politicized and informal society; people here suffer from a low threshold of frustration because of the accumulated military, political, and economic pressures; and the country lacksan established tradition of civility in public discourse.Yet, these are only explanations, not excuses. The situation is too serious to ignore when it sometimes seems, at least to this observer, that the lunatics have taken over the asylum.At times of this sort, we all stand under a holy imperative: do not let the center collapse!What Yeshiva has taught us, both in theory and in practice—the joining of Torah learning and Western culture under the rubric of Torah U’Mada; openness to …

This lecture on tolerance is totally non-political, and yet – may be the most politically relevant one I've ever delivered. I have no partisan end in mind, I do not refer at all exclusively or even primarily to political controversies that sweep this country with the regularity and ferocity of the hurricanes hitting the US East coast during this season. But I believe the theme to be germane to the Israeli scene as much as it is to the American and, indeed, it was occasioned by the most intolerant act in recent Jewish history, namely, the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.As a result of that traumatic event, I appointed a group of scholars and educators to constitute the Commssion on Judaism and Human Values, to study and report on the sources in Judaism and all our sacred lietrature on the themes of tolerance, democracy, and the ethics of dissent. That commission has been assiduously at work and should report to me within the next few months.This present lecture=introduction to the theme—in anticipation of what I expect will be a far more exhaustive treatment of the subject. This evening's presentation is not a systematic treatment, but effort to sketch ideas on role of tolerance in sources of JudaismFirst: tolerance is not an absolute. There are things and ideas that are intolerable to any decent, civilized person. And therefore, there are examples aplenty of intolerant attitudes in Torah: ג״ע שפ״ד ע״ז are good examplesas are עיר הנדחת ובן סורר ומורה. So is לה״ר ורכילות in most instances. Nor, in contemporary life, should we tolerate in our midst rapists, drug-pushers, and muggers.W.V. Quine (Quiddities pp. 206210־): "delicate balance of tolerance." Thus, restraints on terrorism or violence; yet—not excessive, keep regard for due process... So with regard to religion, every other subject...Helen Keller (1880-1968): "Toleration is the greatest gift of the mind; it requires the same effort of the brain that it takes to balance oneself on a bicycle."4.1 n…

When our father Jacob was having problems with his father-in-law and employer, Laban, he turned to him in frustration and said: “I have been with you for twenty years... and I have not eaten any of the animals of your flock... In the daytime I was consumed by drought, and with frost by night. And sleep fled from my eyes” (Genesis 31:38–40). I can sympathize with some though not all of Jacob’s complaints. No one ever accused me of eating any members of Yeshiva’s flocks, although various interesting, imaginative rumors have come to my attention during these past two decades. I have not suffered the radical changes of temperature that afflicted our shepherd forefather; instead, I made up for that with varied kinds of headaches. But I have worked – and worried – quite hard these twenty years, and indeed, often, too often, “sleep fled from my eyes.” But unlike Jacob, I have no complaints; instead, I offer thanks to you – colleagues, trustees, supporters, alumni, students, my very devoted wife and family who have borne with grace so much of the burdens I carried – and, most of all, to the Almighty – for having given me the privilege of serving a cause I consider sacred and an institution that I believe in and love with all my heart and all my soul and all my might. And I pray that God will give me the strength to continue such service into the future. Twenty years is not unusual for a presidency of Yeshiva, but quite rare for the stewardship of an American university. It calls to mind the story of a couple celebrating their 60th wedding anniversary. A local reporter approached them and asked one of them, “How does it feel to have lived 60 years with one person?” The answer: “Oh, it was like two days.” Why two days, the reporter asked. The reply: “Like Yom Kippur and Tisha Be’Av.” In my case, the answer would be that twenty years passed like only one day – Simchat Torah. Not all was song and dance, but there was always the joy of serving a great, transcendent cause with …