No one can deny that anti-Semitism has increased all over the world. Yet we read that new synagogues and centers of Judaism are being built and inaugurated in many places (see A Rabbi’s vision for Jewish community in San Antonio) as if the Diaspora is forever. This brings to mind a startling passage in the Talmud which relates to the centrality of Jewish life in Eretz Yisrael and to the severity of forgetting the central role of the Land of Israel to Torah Judaism.
After the destruction of the Temple there was a strong Jewish community in Babylon whose leader was the important Rabbi Chanania, the nephew of Rabbi Yehoshua. The period was that which followed the downfall of the Bar Kochva rebellion and the destruction of Betar. After the murder of Rabbi Akiva, Chanania remained the “Gadol" (Torah leader) of the generation, and he strived to uphold the Torah in that most difficult period for the Jews.
Yerushalayim was closed to Jews in those days under the rule of Hadrian, the Temple was in ruins, and the great Yeshiva in Yavne was destroyed. The Romans banned the learning of Torah, and a transgressor of their edict received the death punishment. Chanania saw no alternative other than setting up a central yeshiva in exile which would have the authority over all of Israel to calculate and establish the leap years and months, a law specifically relegated to the judicial body in Eretz Yisrael.
Chanania himself was a very righteous man and stressed the importance of the smallest details of the commandments, but due to his great stringency in Torah he despaired of the generation in Eretz Yisrael and the Torah leadership which was subordinate to Rome. He decided to go down to the galut. The Talmud (Berachot 63A and B) relates the subsequent story:
When Chanania the son R. Yehoshua’s brother went down to the exile, he began to intercalate the years and determine the months in chutz l’Aretz. They [the court in Eretz Yisrael] sent after him two scholars: Rabbi Yossi ben Kippar and the grandson of Rabbi. Zecharia ben Kebutal. When he saw them he said to them: “Why have you come?" They replied: “We have come to learn Torah from you."
Chanania finds it a great compliment that these two scholars are coming to learn Torah from him. If he announces that they are giants of Torah it makes him seem even greater.
He thereupon proclaimed: “These men are ‘Gedolai HaDor’ [giants of the generation], and their ancestors have served in the Temple."
Everything was fine until these “students" did the unexpected.
What Chanania began to declare tamei [ritually impure] they declared tahor [pure], and what he forbade they permitted. Every legal decision he made, they contradicted. Chanania was losing face and patience. There was only one thing he could do. He proclaimed about them: “These men are worthless, they are good for nothing." They said to him: “You have already built [us up] you cannot pull [us] down. You have made a fence you cannot break it."
Chanania was trapped. He had bestowed esteem upon them and declared them renowned scholars - how could he now belittle their stature? In a burst of frustration, he cried out: “Why are you doing this to me? Why is it that whatever I declare impure you declare pure, and whatever I say is forbidden you say is permissible?"
Now they revealed the true reason for their “visit." They did not come to learn from him but rather they came with a harsh message from the Rabbis in Eretz Yisrael. It was all a planned-out scheme in order to disrepute him for usurping the central authority of Eretz Yisrael. “Because you intercalate years and determine months in chutz l’Aretz," they informed him. Chanania did not remain without an answer.
He responded: “Did not Akiva the son of Yosef intercalate years and determine months in chutz l’Aretz?"
They replied: “Leave Rabbi Akiva out of this, for he left no one equal to him in Eretz Yisrael." He said to them: “I also left no one equal to me in Eretz Yisrael." They answered him: “The kids you left behind have become goats with horns, and they have sent us to you, and thus they said to us..."
Now comes the message that they brought from the Rabbis in Eretz Yisrael. If it were not written in the Gemara, we would not be able to say such a thing.
Go and tell him [Chanania] in our name. If he listens [to stop usurping the role of Eretz Yisrael], fine; if not, he will be excommunicated! And tell our brethren in the exile [not to listen to Chanania - Rashi]. If they listen, fine; and if not, they should go up to the mountain, let Achia build an altar and let Chanania play the harp, and they should all be heretics and say that they have no portion in the G-d of Israel!!
The only sin of this Jewish community was that they listened to their Rabbi and forgot that Eretz Yisrael is the one and only center of Torah authority. They were a very religious community, they adhered to the words of the Torah and followed their Rabbi’s decisions, whether in laws of purity or forbidden acts. Yet the sin of forgetting the centrality of Eretz Yisrael is considered no longer having a portion in the G-d of Israel!
They are considered as if they no longer belong to the Jewish religion. They should build their own altar and perform their own worship and know that it is no longer Judaism, rather Chanania-ism! It may look the same and have the same customs and laws, but know: “they have no portion in the G-d of Israel!" Chutz l’Aretz is not the vehicle through which the Divine ideals and Divine message flow to the world. It is not the receptacle Hashem made to reveal His will.
This Gemara emphasizes the Divine structure of reality. Torah-Judaism is not a subjective, man-made religion, to be practiced however and wherever one wishes. Just as the laws of nature do not change according to our opinions, so too the system which elevates the world towards the absolute ideal is an objective reality which Hashem determined. Even if an entire community in the Diaspora believes they are the “new Jerusalem," nevertheless, Eretz Yisrael remains the only objective optimal connection to Hashem.
There is a parable about a Bedouin nomad who enters a modern home for the first time. His curiosity is aroused when he sees running water inside the house, coming out of a piece of metal in the wall. After the explanation of the phenomenon, he enquires where he can receive such an amazing device. He is told to enter any hardware store and to request a faucet. He runs out excitedly, buys a faucet and puts it in his tent. But nothing happens. Disappointed and outraged he runs back to the city dweller and screams, “Why did you deceive me? I did what you said, put the faucet in my tent, but no water came out!"
Eretz Yisrael is the vehicle G-d created to receive His ideals, and it will be to no avail to place a faucet anywhere else. If there are no pipes behind the faucet then there will be no flow. This is why the mitzvot in chutz l’Aretz are merely a rehearsal without their full value because there is no flow of Divine energy (Ramban, Vayikra 18:25). Without Eretz Yisrael there can be no “portion in the G-d of Israel," or as the Talmud states: “He who dwells in chutz l’Aretz is as if he has no G-d" (Ketubot 110B). As long as there is an awareness, however, of the central value of Eretz Yisrael, there is hope of receiving a continuation of the light of Torah even in chutz l’Aretz.
At first glance this entire story of Chanania seems outrageous. How did the rabbis in Eretz Yisrael purposely deceive Chanania, embarrass him, and seemingly violate other Torah values. We must remember, however, not only did the Rabbis do such a “trick" in order to get themselves into a position in which they could have the maximum effect on the community, and not only did they say such strong words, but they also found it necessary to include this message in the Talmud in order to educate further generations for the next 1500 years!!
If we understood even a fraction of the true universal influence of the meeting of the Jewish Neshama (soul) with the Holy Land, an influence which infuses a higher life to all existence, we would find this source easier to accept. We would understand why they acted with such extreme tactics in order to save the community from itself by preventing it from severing itself from Eretz Yisrael, its source of life.
When the first generation is exiled to Bavel it feels the anguish of being outside the Land. They mourn, “By the rivers of Bavel... we wept when we remembered Zion... How shall we sing G-d’s song on foreign soil? If I forget thee, O Yerushalayim..." (Tehillim 137). The following generation, however, already begins to adjust and get used to the Diaspora. Life must go on. So the Jews learn the language, the laws and the ways of the foreign culture. “Things aren’t so bad," they say. They build temples and mikvahs and open kosher food stores. The next generation, born in exile, sees chutz l’Aretz as its home.
When exile is seen as the new Jerusalem, this is a dangerous stage with severe ramifications, as Rav Yaacov Emden, the Ohr Samayach, and other great Sages pointed out in their writings. When a community considers itself independent of Eretz Yisrael, the Torah that it professes to uphold is no longer the Torah of Hashem, nor are the holidays which they celebrate any longer considered the holidays of Hashem. The infusion of Divine content is not through the deed of the mitzvah in and of itself but only when the deed is performed according to the will of G-d and according to the exact conditions established by Him, including place and time (see Nefesh HaChaim). Without these conditions the same act is meaningless and is not the religion of the G-d of Israel.
This was the message to that comfortable community in Bavel and to other communities which may fall into the same dangerous situation. The shock treatment had its effect. Immediately all the people broke out into weeping and cried out: “Heaven forbid! We have a portion in the G-d of Israel."
The plan worked perfectly. The community was shocked out of its forgetfulness regarding Eretz Yisrael. The tactics played an important role in saving the people from their error. Had the emissaries simply come from Eretz Yisrael with a politely worded note it would have been discarded as words of “Zionist" Rabbis in Israel. Sometimes harsh tactics are necessary, especially when a Diaspora community considers itself as the new Jerusalem and this “habit becomes second nature" and is taken as a basic truth (until the Mashiach comes, of course). Always, in all situations and places, we are called upon to remember: “For out of Zion shall go forth Torah and the word of the Lord from Yerushalayim."
Rabbi Moshe Kaplan is a teacher at Yeshivat Machon Meir in Jerusalem. The above dvar Torah was excerpted from the book “Torat Eretz Yisrael Anthology."