When asked of the permissibility of violating state orders, many Religious Zionist rabbis answered that the state has legitimate authority, by virtue of its being democratically elected. Following Rav Kook, they said a democratic election by the popular will had some resemblance of a Jewish king, and so the government had the authority to make rulings.
But what happened to the Talmudic dictum that "There is no messenger in the case of a sin"? (A messenger is ordinarily innocent of the message he transmits, but if his message is a deed, he cannot plead that he was following orders; a proxy performing a deed is indeed culpable for his deed, regardless of who ordered him.) The Talmudic aphorism thus says you cannot plead, "I was only following orders". But the SS and Nazis used this excuse at Nuremberg, and the Religious Zionist rabbis would prefer to follow their footsteps.
This is what Rav Hirsch called the idolatrous worship of the state, that it can do no wrong, and that nationalism takes precedence over all else. Nazi Germany epitomizes this idolatrous nationalism, and Religious Zionism seems not so far off.
What is particularly farcical, however, is that these Religious Zionist rabbis justify all this based on the principle that a democracy has authority. But even in America, the father of modern democracy, this would never pass muster! The right to bear arms explicitly enshrines the right of the people to stand up, violently even, against government corruption and crime. (Nevermind the fact that a laity armed with pistols and shotguns wouldn't stand a chance against America's modern army. That isn't the point.) But the Religious Zionist rabbis would prefer to arrogate to the democratic government, the same powers possessed by an authoritarian monarchy, in the name of democracy, even though America would never do such. You shouldn't be more pious than the pope!
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5 comments:
What, Jews don't believe in vox populi, vox dei?
Mishna Avot 3:13. Compare Malachi 3:16 and Sukkah 49b, Bamidbar
Rabbah II, Sifre Zutta Nasa 22; Yalkut Shimoni Naso 711, etc, etc
Very good points. But note that while there is a clear hierarchy, the superiority of the Torah does not completely absolve the government of power. That is to say, as long as we regard the state of Israel for what it is- a state, not a king or a god- we must submit ourselves to its authority insofar as its laws are consistent with the Torah. Thus, we are bound to follow those state laws that do not directly conflict with halacha. (Maybe that seems obvious, but as you've posted one extreme, I'm imagining the other extreme, in which individuals refuse to recognize the authority of the state and decide that as long as they adhere to halacha, everything will be okay. Such a situation would cause a total societal upheaval and lack of order.)
Gila, I agree. Even if the state has no Messianic significance whatsoever, I cannot understand why the Haredim do not at least arrogate to it "dina d'malchuta dina".
But there too, the government's laws are legitimate only insofar as they do not violate halakhah. (But adding onto halakhah is no problem; for example, a law to have civil marriage along with kiddushin is not a problem. But a violation of halakhah, such as civil marriage in lieu of kiddushin, we cannot tolerant.)
But all the same, the state's reign does of course have binding implications, in the mitzvah to obey the government.
Skeptic, can you please summarize some of those sources, for those who do not have them readily available?
As for Avot 3:13, that G-d is pleased with he who has the approval of the people: people often nitpick this, and ask how this can be so. What if someone is a gangster, and earns the approval of his fellow gangsters? Does brotherly love automatically grant approval in G-d's eyes?
But this interpretation is tendentious. We shouldn't read this mishnah overly rigorously. The point is that G-d loves when His children get along; as Rabbi Telushkin says in the name of Dennis Prager, G-d would rather His children love each other and hate Him, than vice versa.
To attempt to derive more from this teaching is reaching overfar, I believe.
Indeed, G-d merely scattered the generation of the Tower of Babel, rather than kill them, because despite their idolatry, they had brotherly unity. (We are relying on a midrashic reading that may not be historically true, but that's not the point. As Rabbi Berkovits says in With God in Hell, the Rabbis reinterpreted the clear sense of Scripture in order to express the underlying ethos of Judaism; Professor G. F. Moore says the same. See what I write at http://michaelmakovi.blogspot.com/2009/01/midrash-aggadah.html.) Similarly, there is the pasuk about Ephraim worshiping idols, but being left alone unpunished, because they committed idolatry with brotherly unity.
So indeed, great is unity and brotherly love. But it is not absolute; the Flood came for the sin of theft, despite the fact that it was done with brotherly unity! Indeed, the lenient treatment for the Tower, and the strict treatment for the Flood, suggest that sins between man and G-d, and sins between man and man, are judged differently in regards to how brotherly unity affects their severity: Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo suggests that sins bein adam laMakom become less serious as more people commit them, whereas sins bein adam l'Havero become more serious. Thus, the Tower of Babel's idolatry was merely punished with dispersal (rather than death), whereas theft was punished with death (rather than merely with a monetary fine).
According to Rabbi Cardozo, then, the brotherly unity of the criminals actually makes their sin worse, not better, as this teaching in Avot 3:13 would seem to suggest!
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