Medinat Yisrael and Kedushat HaAretz - HaRav Shlomo Yosef Zevin

In this article written in Hatzofeh in December/January 1947-8, a few months before the establishment of the State of Israel (and reprinted in Techumin volume 10 with new material added), Rav Zevin reviews the history of קדושת הארץ and possible ramifications of a renewal of significant Jewish settlement in the Land.

On one level, the Land has independent kedusha, as reflected in various statements in the Gemara and Midrashim about God's concern for the Land and how one who lives in Israel has a God, while one who lives outside of Israel is as if he has no God. This kedusha is eternal, and is not connected to where Jews are living at a given moment.

Rav Zevin then discusses the kedusha that accompanies Jewish settlement in the Land, and differentiates between the kedusha that came about at the time of Yehoshua's entry to the Land and that which devolved at the time of Ezra's leading the Jews back from the Babylonian exile. The kedusha from the time of Yehoshua was created via conquest and perhaps via the building of the Beit HaMikdash, and most commentaries hold that this kedusha was nullified when the first Beit HaMikdash was destroyed and the people were exiled.

By contrast, the Jews who returned to build the second Beit HaMikdash did not conquer the Land, but merely built up settlements, and thus the kedusha at that time was created via their seizing of the Land. However, there is a debate as to whether this kedusha was full-force, or whether it only created a d'Rabbanan-level obligation for מצוות התלויות בארץ such as giving תרומות ומעשרות. According to Rambam, the obligation was only d'Rabbanan, since we require ביאת כולכם - everyone coming to the Land in order to restore the full kedusha. As with the kedusha from the time of Yehoshua, there is a debate as to whether or not this second kedusha was nullfied when the Beit HaMikdash was destroyed.

Based on these considerations, Rav Zevin discusses several issues that may now become relevant as Jews were about to return after two thousand years to their Land:

1) The Negev - the southern part of Israel falls outside of the borders that were conquered by the Jews at the time of Yehoshua, but well within the area promised to the forefathers. As such, it is possible that while crops grown there may not be subject to an obligation to give תרומות ומעשרות דאורייתא, there may nevertheless be a fulfillment of מצות ישוב הארץ for one who lives there.

2) The overall kedusha of the Land - if those who returned from Babylon could put kedusha back into effect by settling the Land, is it possible that the same could happen with those who are now returning. And, if so, can they re-create the kedusha in a way that it could spread to regions that had not previously been settled?

3) If a majority of Jews return to the Land, will we reach a situation of ביאת כולכם that would make fulfilling the mitzvot of the Land into מצוות דאורייתא? This was debated by Rav Chaim Soloveitchik and his student Rav Isser Zalman Meltzer [interesting trivia - Rav Chaim's great granddaughter is Rabbanit Tova Lichtenstein and Rav Isser Zalman's granddaughter is Rabbanit Miriam Amital]. Rav Chaim held that ביאת כולכם was tied to a historical moment and could only happen during the days of Ezra, while Rav Isser Zalman felt that it could happen at any time. Beyond that debate, there is the question of whether ביאת כולכם means literally all Jews or if we could invoke the well-known dictum of רובו ככולו and only require a majority of world Jewry to move to Israel in order to have a higher level of kedusha kick in. Rav Zevin sides with the view that we can invoke רובו ככולו [ed. note - we are getting very close to this point right now].

4) The mitzva of settling the Land - Rav Zevin concludes by noting that according to Ramban, one of the 613 mitzvot is to settle the Land, which the Marcheshet rules includes living in the Land and acquiring land in Israel. As we now have our own State, we finally have, for the first time in two millenia, the opportunity to fulfill this mitzva in all of its aspects.

May we merit to see the continual flowering of the גאולה and may we do our part in helping Hashem to fulfill וקבצנו יחד מארבע כנפות הארץ.

Soldiers refusing orders - Rav Yaakov Ariel - Techumin 4

In this article written in 1983, Rav Ariel deals with the question of whether or not soldiers are allowed to refuse orders. Specifically, he grapples with the issue of refusing the order to clear out Yamit and to invade Beirut. He also discusses following an order to begin a siege on Shabbat, as well as doling out collective punishment to Arabs in Yehuda and Shomron. The common denominator of all of these cases is the presence of a religious, halachic, or national consideration that stood in opposition to the official military order.


Rav Ariel's first approach is to consider a military order in the context of being a גזירת המלך. Rambam, based on the Gemara in Sanhedrin says that one may disobey a military assignment if it contradicts a mitvza, since דברי הרב ודברי התלמיד דברי מי שומעין - we obviously listen to God over listening to any of His subjects if the two are in contradiction to one another. In this vein, he cites a teshuva of the Chacham Tzvi who compares listening to a royal decree to the mitzva of כבוד אב ואם, specifically with regard to the fact that in neither case may one violate another mitzva in order to obey or respect another human. However, there are Rishonim who qualify this. The Meiri in Moed Katan writes that one may set learning Torah in order to do a mitzva that cannot be done by someone else, such as respecting one's parents, and in Sanhedrin he writes that a royal edict cannot override the public study of Torah, but it can override study by an individual.


Rav Ariel then distinguishes between כבוד and מורא, between respecting one's parents and fearing them, noting that in the former case one can set aside a mitzva, but not in the latter. As such, when it comes to following a royal order, since we are only commanded to fear a king, we can ignore the order we are doing so in order to perform a mitzva. Extending this line of thinking to our cases, Rav Ariel rules that refusing orders for a subjective לשם שמים purpose would not constitute a rebellious act.

From there, Rav Ariel considers a view of the Netziv that refusing an order contains an element of פקוח נפש, to the possible extent that someone who refuses an order is considered to be a rodef insofar as he is potentially endangering others while he remains safe at home (based on the story in Bamidbar of Bnei Gad and Bnei Reuven). However, Rav Ariel also considers the spiritual peril that is brought about by an order that demands that someone violate halacha. As such, he advises soldiers to determine whether an order is objectionable from a subjective or an objective perspective, and to take counsel with a posek if they are not capable of making such a determination. Furthermore, he concludes that if it is too close to call, then the danger posed by refusing an order outranks the danger of fulfilling an order that seems to violate a halachic position, and in such a case the soldier should fulfill the order given to him.

In the conclusion, Rav Ariel deals with the specific cases that were brought to him:

1) With regard to a siege in the Sinai that was to begin on Shabbat, apparently this particular order was not an emergency situation, and thus Rav Ariel felt that one could refuse such an order. However, he noted that in general one can violate Shabbat for a military mission under emergency conditions.

2) With regard to evacuating the Yamit settlement, Rav Ariel ruled that soldiers were obligated to follow orders, based on the reasoning that the governmental decision to give over Yamit may have been a mistake in judgement, but was not intended to harm the Jewish people or the State of Israel. (See the statement by Mori V'Rabi HaRav Aharon Lichtenstein on the disengagement from Gaza in 2005 for more on this issue.)

3) With regard to soldiers who did not want to go to Beirut, Rav Ariel ruled that they are required to go, as refusing an order in a wartime situation is a particularly egregious act. Since one cannot prove objectively that the war is wrong and any arguments on that issue are based on one's political worldview, there is little room to allow for someone to be a conscientious objector.

4) With regard to soldiers asked to adminsiter collective punishment to Arab residents of Yehuda and Shomron, Rav Ariel permitted them to refuse the order assuming that the order was objectively in error. He felt that most of the Arabs living there were not actively at war with Israel and thus we nee to consider the idea of maintaining דרכי שלום with our non-Jewish neighbors.

Living in Israel - Rav Tzvi Yehuda HaKohen Kook

In this brief teshuva, cited in Techumin volume 3, Rav Tzvi Yehuda affirms that there is definitely a mitzva to live in Israel, as per the view of Ramban. He then goes further and notes that just like one is required to give his life for any mitzva in a situation where he is being forced not to do it [my note: specifically in times of religious persecution], even more so in the case of living in Israel, which is a mitzva that is seen as tantamount to all other mitzvot, one must make whatever sacrifices necessary to fulfill it. This mitzva even goes beyond other mitzvot in this regard, in that a person must put himself into a potentially dangerous situation of living in Israel.

Living in Israel - Igrot Moshe Even HaEzer 1:102

In the last paragraph of a teshuva about a different topic (written in 1952), Rav Moshe Feinstein addresses the issue of whether or not there is a mitzva to live in Israel nowadays. He says that most poskim feel that it is a mitzva. However, he notes that these days it is not a mitzva chiyuvit (one that a person must strive to fulfill in all cases), but rather it is a mitzva kiyumit (a mitzva that one gets credit for doing if he does it, but does not have to put himself in a situation where it becomes obligatory). In making this ruling, Rav Moshe relies on the view of a Ba'al Tosafot named Rav Chaim cited in Tosafot Ketubot 110b, who notes that nowadays (meaning already 800 years ago) there was not a requirement to live in Israel since doing so would potentially trigger the requirement to keep a variety of mitzvot connected to the land, and since we are not fully sure how to keep those mitzvot or if we even can, thus it might be better to avoid such a situation.