A lot of what I wanted to say about this topic has been said better than I could have done it in the past few weeks. So I just want to connect some dots.
The staff at the YU commentator put out an editorial about the american response, or more accurately, the lack thereof, to the holocaust as it was occurring. The first comment there is from some Adam Zimilover, who wrote a more detailed paper documenting the reaction to the holocaust. I think it is appropriate to take the time to read these articles.
The bottom line is that the american response to the holocaust was abysmal. Our people went through the greatest catastrophe ever, one that perhaps makes even the near-tragedy of purim seem like nothing. And yet, by purim klal yisrael managed to gather together and make fast days and cry out and daven to hashem. By the holocaust - kimat nothing.
My great grandfather was one of the 400 rabbonim who marched upon washington, and he also helped raise money for the vaad hatzalah. He was not the only one. But even that level of response was nothing in the face of the overwhelming terror facing the Jewish people, and by and large, most Jews in america didn't even do that.
The commentator article I posted a while back was dated January 1945. Can you imagine debating whether or not its proper for YU to have a drama society while as you are speaking, Jews are being murdered every second by Hitler yemach shemo? I don't know if I can conceive of such a thing, and thank G-d, we live in a safer world where such things should remain inconceivable.
(Some guy commented on the commentator article that this is a complex issue that is being unduly simplified. I totally disagree. I also don't buy for 1 second these garbage excuses that they didn't know what was happening. Jabotinsky knew BEFORE the holocaust that it would happen, and the fact that people chose to be in denial does not mean they didn't know.)
When you realize this, you make a heavy accusation against our ancestors alive at the time, and its a little scary to make such accusations. How do we understand this?
Before we make such accusations, we need to look in a mirror. and I'm afraid that what we will find there is not much better.
Divrei chaim posted here about how while it was easy to organize tehillim rallies for various issues on the yeshivishe agenda, no one - in either the yeshivish or modern orthodox worlds - saw fit to organize any such event concerning the very real dangers klal yisrael faces from Iran and other enemies yimach shemam.
Last year there was a war going on Israel. People maybe had the time to grudgingly say a few perakim of tehillim. But overall, nothing changed - life went on as normal.
People who had midterms were too busy studying for them to have time to care about what was going on in Israel. Our busy schedules didn't let up - life went on as normal.
Its true that the war in Israel was not anywhere on the scale of past tragedies that have afflicted the jewish people. But is that really good excuse? Moreover,we should sit down and take the time to do some self-reflection - would we really have reacted differently if G-d forbid there ever were a tragedy to befall the jewish people rachmana litzlan?
Its not at all surprising that people were able to sit here and debate drama clubs while the holocaust was going on - we do almost the exact same thing when we study for a chemistry midterm while a war is going on Israel - we let the distance of the tragedy, as opposed to the immediate needs of our daily lives, lull us into ignoring the tragedy and focusing on the stupidity of the here and now.
One could counter this criticism by saying that life does need to go on in places where the tragedy isn't hitting. To a certain extent, I agree. But to a certain extent, I bidavka disagree - life needs to somewhat NOT go on in recognition of a tzarah facing klal yisrael.
We know from rashi in several places in bereshis that tashmish is assur in a time of tragedy - thats a real disruption to family life, but so be it.
Further, life needing to go on is not a stirah to taking a tzarah seriously (more so than saying 4 perakim of tehillim or something like that.)
Please G-d, we should never see another tragedy or tzarah befall klal yisrael ever again. But if rachmana litzlan such a thing should ever come to be, then I want to throw out 2 ideas:
1. For every day that the tragedy persists, give x dollars (some significant amount) towards alleviating that tzarah. you can't just give one sum and be done - every day the tzarah goes on you have to be part of it and contribute to the cause.
2. I dont understand why the institution of taanis tzibbur as per the shulchan aruch 576 (and look there - the fasts are much more intense than the way we typically do a fast day.) has been abolished. the mishna berura mentions maybe ein taanis tzibbur bibavel and i am not at all holding in these halachos. but again, the idea that motivates and permeates all these halachos is that klal yisrael cannot remain apathetic in the face of a tazarah - we must care, and it must affect us.
we should be zocheh to never know any tzaros again and see the geulah sheleimah speedily in our days
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