16 Responses

1. “We are not seeking confrontation” and “no compromise” are inherently contradictory, and not reflective of the peshara that is entirely possible.

2. Is he prepared, as were his predecessors in the 1920s, to offer to ally with the Arabs – since when push comes to shove, that the only option open. If they aren’t willing to be an autonomous community in a Muslim state, the Israeli hareidim are painted into a corner.

   Alternatively, they might compromise by limiting the penalty for refusing to serve in the army to loss of subsidies, combined with a robust policy of accomodation of religious practices in the army, liberal subsidies for veterans learning in yeshiva, and effective ban on discrimination against hareidim in the workplace (something that most hilonim will object to).

3. Like the legendary King Canute, ordering the sea to stop its tide, the chareidm are tilting at windmills. What the Chareidim pretend is their chareid way of life was never the way of the jewish people . Never has this way of life, of not working and relying on the klal, been part of our tradition. By insisting on this unrealistic bid only makes the possibility of a war on the chareidim more possible.

4. “rabbiofberlin” – 1) Canute was ordering the tides to prove he was incapable of doing it; 2) Most hilonim agree the tide has been turning for the last 200 years, and the hareidim are slow to understand that Torah and Mitsvos are out, and secular nationalism is “in”; 3) The hilonim don’t feel there is a shortage of soldiers or a shortage of workers (regardless of whether you count teachers in hareidi schools to be employed – the USA and UK would, the Israelis don’t) – they feel there is a serious surplus of hareidim that is threatening the character of their medinah; 4) Learning has always been the basis of Jewish life, and scholars were always the most prized profession; 5) If the Israeli army, and the civilian economy, would allow hareidim to enter without expecting them to act contrary to halacha as we understand it, the yeshivos would lose most of their students – many of which are gainfully employed in Israel thriving “grey” economy

5. It was bad enough to have Litzman acting as health minister where again he demonstrated his ignorance of public health policy and used the position to assure the continued flow of NIS to his mosdos and block needed reforms in the national health network. Now he says there is “no compromise” on the most fundamental domestic policty issue confronting the nation. Two thirds of Israelis in a recent poll said they favored “sharing the burden” or whatever you want to call the need for chareidi bachurim to make some contribution to society. He says NO….to bad…he and his chareidi cohorts are about to get a rude political awakening.

6. I will repeat what I have been saying for years: The only equitable solution is to abolish the draft. It is a military, social and economic disaster.

7. rabbiofberlin said: “What the Chareidim pretend is their chareid way of life was never the way of the jewish people . Never has this way of life, of not working and relying on the klal, been part of our tradition.”

   akuperma said: “Learning has always been the basis of Jewish life, and scholars were always the most prized profession;”

   akuperma,
   I think RoB was referring to the idea that *everyone* is in yeshiva kollel for years on end, not there were not learners.

8. #7 – In Eretz Yisrael most Jews were members of a kollel, which was the vehicle of transfering funds from abroad. How much an invividual got would depend on a variety of factors, such as “need” and how much they spent learning. That the Israeli turned a “kollel” into a “graduate school” was due to the need to find a way to avoid a confrontation with hareidim who if drafted would refuse to serve and thereby throw open the discussion of whether the zionists were usurpers. What modern hareidim see as the way of life, especially in America where the government doesn’t require “learning full time” as a condition of avoid conscription, is the traditional Jewish life – albeit modified to peace and prosperity The fact is that when frum Jews have a standard of living slightly above starving, they tend to want to work less and spend more time on mitsvos (what economists would note is the “backward bending supply curb of labor” – except our’s bends backwards early than most).

9. “In Eretz Yisrael most Jews were members of a kollel”
   What? Most Jews are not in Kollel, unless you are saying that non-charaidim are not Jews. If you are talking about long ago, that’s can’t be either. In pre-industrial societies, it took 80% of the people working most of the day to raise enough food to subside. Anyways, you missed the point, which was that throughout our history we had only a fraction of us that became learners for life. Most of us worked.

10. apukerma- i don’t what you are smoking but I’d like some of this ! I find your easrly comments incomprehensible so I’ll just concentrate on your latter one. It has been established for thousands of years that work is part of am a man’s duty. It is in the Torah (Parshat mishpatim), it is in the gemoro (Kiddushin perek 1,berachos perek 6) and it is an obligation that every husband takes upon himself when signing the kessuboh. Never- let me repeat- never has there been such a situation that tens of thousands of men refuse to work and throw themselves on the klal.It is unnatural and cannot be sustained.

11. the Charaidim have no leverage, the fact is Jews always worked all the special few were in klei kodesh everyone else worked ask people about the heim pre-Hitler.

12. Hey# 6 above, what would you suggest Israel do if it abolished the draft? Ask the towel heads to fight for us?
    Get real turkey and crawl back into your hole.

13. Chizkiyahu HaMelech put a sword in front of beis medrash. Anyone who did not learn full-time was punished. Sanhedrin 94b

    Since the security of Israel depended on the learning, anyone who didn’t learn placed the land at mortal risk.

14. Like the legendary King Canute, ordering the sea to stop its tide

    Just a couple of small – but crucial – points, rabbiofberlin:

    1. King Canute was not legendary at all – far from it. Cnut the Great was born around 985 or 995 and was niftar 12 November 1035). He was more commonly known as Canute, was a king of Denmark, England, Norway and parts of Sweden.

    2. It was not Canute who (was)”ordering the sea to stop its tide. Quite the contrary: it was his courtiers (= askanim) who were trying to flatter the king that he was all-omnipotent.

15. to chaim be jehuda and apukerma: I checked wikipedia- it confirms that it was indeed Canute that sat on his throne and ordered the tide to stop coming in (not the courtiers) and, as apukerma says, it seems that this was to show that he (Canute) did not have the kind of power attributed to him . And, lastly, my description as “legendary’ did not mean that he was a legend and not real, just that he was known for a long time afterwards and many stories (legends) were written about him.

16. I keep repeating this because it is so essential to the larger discussion – Rambam clearly wrote that you’re NOT allowed to just learn full-time and say that you’ll live off of money from others (tzedaka). In fact, Rambam says that doing so will make you lose olam haba, steal, ruin your yiddishkeit, and some other pretty strong words against it. Read what he says yourself! The only thing people point to in the Rambam to refute this is where he gives a bracha wish to those who do undertake learning full-time, that Hashem should provide & protect them. This is not a machloket with his other statement – Rambam is clear that you are NOT allowed to simply say that I refuse to work. By the way, even the best learners of Jewish history ‘worked’ – sometimes by teaching, sometimes by leading the community, sometimes by being a doctor, sometimes by running a store, sometimes by being a shepard, sometimes by being a shoe cobbler, sometimes by being a tailor.
    NEVER in Jewish history do we have an entire population of Jews refusing to work & declaring that they learn full-time! Even the Kohanim & Levi’im worked in the Beit Hamikdash – this meant real work needed to be done there, NOT that they just learned in the Beit Midrash. There were also chachamim that worked as Judges, but that’s also work.