Rabbinic Leadership in Two Discussions by R

SHALOM CARMY

“The Heart Pained by the Pain of the People”: Rabbinic Leadership in Two Discussions by R. Joseph B. Soloveitchik

s far as I know, Maran ha-Rav Joseph Soloveitchik never devoted a discourse to the halakhic or theological question of rabbinic A authority in our time as it applies to subjects outside the bound- aries of Halakhah, narrowly defined. As a spiritual leader, his goal was the teaching of Torah and the cultivation of authentic religious experience. In this connection, he spoke and wrote often, almost obsessively, about the relationship between teacher and student. However, the precise delineation of the authority that can, or should be exercised by pri- mary Torah mentors was probably not an important question from this perspective. It did not contribute, in a significant way, to one’s knowl- edge of Torah, or ability to think independently in studying Torah and confronting life’s challenges. Not infrequently, the Rav told us that the role of a Rebbi is not to tell his disciples what to do, but rather to create the appropriate “frame of reference” for their decisions. By this he

SHALOM CARMY teaches Bible, Jewish thought and philosophy at Yeshiva University and is editor of Tradition. Rabbi Carmy has published extensively and is the editor of two volumes in the Orthodox Forum series, most recently Jewish Perspec- tives on the Experience of Suffering. 1 The Torah u-Madda Journal (13/2005) 2 The Torah u-Madda Journal meant not only an introduction to halakhic literature and its analysis, but also a “philosophy,” a way of thinking about, and weighing, the principles underlying the Halakhah, a living sense of religious experience, and a sensitivity to human variety and particular circumstance. There are many anecdotes about the latitude he allowed his students, when they encountered problems in their work, recognizing that each person has his, or her, own individual dispositions that facilitate or hamper their response to specific situations, and urging them to rely on their hard won perceptions of local conditions. This reputation has led many in the community, both lay people and rabbis, to assume that the Rav limited rabbinic authority to the adjudication of halakhic law, that he did not assign the opinions of Gedolim very much weight in determining public and private policy, and that he therefore did not consider consultation with Torah authorities an essential, or even an important ingredient in a healthy religious community. People who otherwise exhibit little interest in the Rav’s substantial achievement as a religious thinker and writer contentiously attempt to rehabilitate him as a conventional “authoritarian” gadol. They are countered by equally desperate voices, anxious to save him for modernity. Much of this debate takes place with little or no reference to the Rav’s own published record. Let us examine the Rav’s most pertinent written remarks on the subject. The subject is that of momentous matters concerning Jewish destiny, not trivial decisions or very particular choices facing individuals in their secular lives. These documents are separated by an interval of two very eventful decades. For that reason it is not implausible that differences in emphasis and even in doctrine are due to a change of mind. Instead of pre-judging the issue, however, we will analyze the proposi- tions arising from both texts, and compare them to the famous doctrine of rabbinic authority found in the work of R. Eliyahu Dessler. I believe that the Rav says both more and less, at several points, than many of us may recall.

Eulogy for a Gadol

R. H. ayyim Ozer Grodzinski of Vilna, venerable sage of the Moetzes Gedolei Hatorah, was the recognized authority, in matters of public policy, for Agudath Israel, and in particular for the Lithuanian Torah world. He died, of natural causes, shortly after the outbreak of World War II. R. Soloveitchik, at the time, was vice president of Agudah in Shalom Carmy 3

America. In that capacity, he delivered a eulogy, part of which was later published as “Bearers of the Z. iz. and the H. oshen,” referring to the head- band and breastplate worn by the High Priest.1 In the Rav’s homiletic elaboration, the Z. iz. symbolizes the purely intellectual, halakhic aspect of Torah leadership, while the H. oshen rep- resents the guidance provided by Torah authority on public questions. The Z. iz. , which atones for impurity, was placed on the priest’s forehead, the locus of intellect. The H. oshen, covering the heart, ruled on an entirely different sort of problem. In Bible and Talmud, the standard examples of such consultation have to do with war. The Rav offers contemporary examples: the advisability of public protest against a threat- ening regime (a question of great import in the 1930’s); attitudes towards various phenomena of modernity; Jewish responses to social conditions. These challenges require engagement of the heart: “the heart pained by the pain of its people, the heart sensitive to the trouble of the nation, the heart that sorrows with Israel” (192). For thousands of years of exile and wandering, continues the Rav, the same authority that decided halakhic questions also exercised leadership in the public arena. The “priest” who responded to technical halakhic inquiries was also the leader who addressed the questions of war and peace, hope and despair, Jewish attitudes towards the nations of the world. He contrasts this time-honored practice with a recent tendency to separate the two roles. Those who adopt this modernist approach con- fine Gedolei Yisrael to the “private domain,” while new leaders, “distant from God’s Torah, have donned the H. oshen and tried to instruct the people about the proper path” (193). The Rav cites a rabbinic dictum: “Any priest who does not speak with the divine spirit (ruah. ha-kodesh) should not be consulted [as bearer of the urim ve-tummim].” He con- cludes: “it is impossible for the heart to be suffused with love of Israel unless the intellect is consecrated to God.” R. H. ayyim Ozer’s outstanding virtue, according to this eulogy, was his insistence on the unity of the two roles. He recognized that if “modern leaders, who reject Torah and tradition, take hold of the H. oshen ha- Mishpat, they will misdirect the people” (193-4). Experience demonstrates that such leaders, “partially assimilated” in form and content, given to flattery and obsequiousness, are prone to error in their political life as much as in their religious orientation. R. H. ayyim Ozer’s testament, then, is “conquer the H. oshen, for the fate of the Z. iz. depends on it.” Overall this text appears to provide aid and comfort to supporters of da‘at Torah. It is hard to imagine advocates of lay authority reading it 4 The Torah u-Madda Journal without cringing. Yet before moving on we should note that the Rav does not argue here for the existence of a contemporary institution embody- ing da‘at Torah, a central authoritative body, operating in our time, on the model of the Sanhedrin, whose pronouncements Jews are obligated to follow. He does not, in other words, use the opportunity of the hesped to endorse the hard line ideology that something like Moetzes Gedolei Hatorah ought to serve as the final clearinghouse for practical political policy. Instead he delineates an ideal of Torah scholarship, piety and political leadership that is not tied to a specific political alignment, and that is exemplified in the charismatic personality of R. H. ayyim Ozer. It is worth noting that the Rav’s father, R. Moshe Soloveichik, judged Agudah harshly because it treated rabbinic leaders too much as if they were instruments of the political apparatus. R. Moshe maintained pub- licly, and strenuously, that his father, R. H. ayyim Brisker, had associated with Agudah for only a brief period, at the time of its founding, but had soon become disillusioned with the political atmosphere that, in his opinion, usurped the place of genuine Torah authority in the movement.2 Later, in the 1960’s, after becoming spiritual leader of the Mizrachi, the Rav was attacked for statements deviating from his party’s position and lending potential support to its electoral rivals. In a letter of complaint to S. Z. Shragai, the Rav allowed himself some choice words about being expected to toe the party line and being abused like a renegade when he failed to conform. If it was honor that he wanted, he says, he could have done better to join an unnamed party of “zealots” who “demand nothing of their followers (not diligence at the gates of Torah, nor unadulterated fear of Heaven, nor dispersal of funds for charity, nor punctilious obser- vance of miz. vot) except expressions of vilification and scorn regarding our movement.” In other words, it was precisely the politicization of Torah that had displeased him in the unnamed movement antagonistic to Mizrachi.3 The Rav’s later reactions could be ascribed to hindsight, but it is impossible to dismiss the weight that his father’s opinion must have carried for him, even during his Agudah phase. Why are Torah sages better qualified to offer worldly guidance to the Jewish people than the new secular leadership? Though he does not mount a discursive argument, the Rav indicates several reasons. He takes it for granted that unified leadership is hallowed by the tradition of millennia. At several points he refers to the ignorance of the new leaders and to their distance from authentic Judaism. His eulogy, however, is built around the image of the two priestly vestments and the complementary functions of head and heart. Thus the major theme is Shalom Carmy 5 that the intellectual leaders of the Jewish people, the great scholars of Torah, are also the custodians of the Jewish heart. Those who are not immersed in the world of Torah cannot truly identify with the true life of the people, their pain and their welfare. The Rav is addressing a receptive audience. It is not evident how he would justify his thesis in the face of skepticism. He does not take advan- tage of one effective strategy often employed today by defenders of expanded rabbinic authority. He does not claim that all practical questions ultimately have halakhic ramifications, so that one cannot approach decisions about the advisability of protest or allocation of resources without employing an explicit and specific “Torah perspective.” Thus, for example, if the highest priority for Judaism is the establishment of yeshivot, then any political activity that might jeopardize that goal must be eschewed as a matter of strict Halakhah. Perhaps the Rav avoided this road because even the observant community of that time might balk at the notion that worldly and spiritual problems are always so inextricably intertwined that one cannot be decided without expertise in the other. After all, Halakhah itself, as the Briskers knew well, relied on medical authority in case of illness. Within the framework of this text one might derive from the Rav a two-pronged justification of the thesis that gedolei Torah are uniquely qualified to measure the practical needs and troubles of the Jewish people. On the negative side, as the Rav notes, the new leadership is charac- terized by a tendency toward assimilation. Consequently the new leaders fail to appreciate the true needs of their fellow Jews, even at a practical “secular” level. Furthermore, the temptation to identify with and flatter Gentile society might also lead them to exaggerate the benevolence and beneficence of that society, even while minimizing the suffering and risks of their Jewish brethren. By the 1950’s the Rav spoke bitterly of the Jewish cult of Roosevelt that deterred Jewish leaders from speaking out during the Holocaust.4 The positive argument for Torah leadership in the secular realm would be that possessors of Torah, in addition to their role in transmit- ting Torah she-be-al peh, are also, virtually by definition, the authentic representatives of kelal Yisrael. In a well-known talmudic lecture on the role of Bet Din in setting the calendar, delivered a couple of years after the eulogy for R. H. ayyim Ozer, the Rav highlighted this dual aspect of Torah leadership. Even if he does not identify contemporary Torah leaders with the ideal Sanhedrin, the analogy may be reflected in the claim that Torah authorities enjoy special access to the heart of the Jewish people.5 6 The Torah u-Madda Journal

In the coming decades the Rav’s orientation changed significantly. Yet, when we study his later utterances, I do not believe that we can detect straightforward contradiction between his pronouncements as a leader of Agudah and the thoughts communicated to the Religious Zionists of America.

The Loneliness of the Religious Zionist

The first of the Rav’s discourses on Zionism, published together as Four Derashot in Yiddish and Five Derashot in Hebrew, is dominated by the contemporary interpretation of Joseph and his brothers.6 As in the biblical version, Joseph stands alone among his family. But while the biblical Joseph is hated because his brothers resent his favored status with their father and discern in his demeanor and dreams a lust for domination, the Joseph of the discourse is hated because his dreams foresee future challenges that will necessitate difficult changes. The Rav’s Joseph is a religious Zionist, who knows that the tried and true model of life in exile can no longer flourish in the modern world. Joseph’s brothers represent the Lithuanian rabbinic world from which the Rav emerged, which opposed Zionism. As history vindicated the biblical Joseph, who saved his family in time of famine, so history justi- fies the Zionist venture. The religious Zionist, in 1902 and after, was lonely because he was estranged from his brothers, meaning the great body of the Torah community. This estrangement came to expression in ridicule directed at the religious Zionist, in suspicion about his piety and in keeping their distance from him (19). Here the Rav alludes to widespread attitudes in Orthodox circles towards religious Zionism and its rabbis, including the conviction that Zionism was not only wrong but that is also inevitably went along with an attenuated commitment to Torah. He spells out exactly who Joseph’s brothers are. The sons of Jacob—the elite of Ortho- doxy—include the great teachers of Torah (Levi), the leaders of the generation, “the genuine providers who were concerned with the needs of the congregation, whose words were like the words of the urim ve-tummim on all political and social questions” (Judah), and the charismatic H. asidic leaders (Benjamin). Alienation from his brothers is so painful to Joseph because he totally identifies with their community: “Joseph too possessed greatness in Torah, leadership and piety. . . . That they, not just some of them, but most of them, separated from him, was a tragedy for Joseph” (20). Shalom Carmy 7

According to this discourse, the rift between religious Zionism and anti-Zionist Orthodoxy, like the enmity between Joseph and his brothers, was rooted in misunderstanding. For Joseph, there was a disquieting dream of agriculture replacing shepherding in a strange land. The prophecy to Abraham of sojourning in a foreign country required fore- sight and planning. In order to survive as a distinctive entity under new conditions, the family would have to learn new skills, adapt to new tech- nology in a radically different civilization. The brothers stubbornly resisted his initiative, and as he tried to persuade them, disagreement hardened into resentment. They were satisfied that their present way of life in Canaan could sustain them in a manner compatible with a life of sanctity and purity. The contemporary application is obvious. Like Joseph’s brothers, “the great men of Israel and supreme saints” a century ago, were reason- ably satisfied with the status quo. Faithful Jewry constituted the quanti- tative and qualitative plurality of Eastern European Jewry: the syna- gogues flourished; so did Torah study (22). The religious Zionist of 1902 agreed that under these circumstances, there was no justification to join a movement headed by secularists. However, the Joseph of 1902 experi- enced a disquieting vision of the future. He felt, even though he might not have been able to explain his intuition of disaster, his sense that hard, unprecedented days were coming. After these remarks comes the oft-quoted distinction between halakhic adjudication and history that is taken to define the Rav’s rejec- tion of da‘at Torah. In the domain of Halakhah, “the Torah is not in Heaven:” “God granted the sages of Israel the authority to rule” (23). With respect to historical questions, pertaining not to the ritual purity of an oven or a loaf or the ownership of a sum of money, but rather to the “fate of the eternal people,” God Himself hands down the verdict. And the Rav wonders what would have happened to the yeshivot and Torah scholars after the Holocaust had the Zionist Joseph not secured a place in the land of Israel. The Rav’s version of the inter-Orthodox debate on Zionism is not a systematic unbiased outline. Most of his comments concern the wide range of challenges posed by modernity—adaptation to industrial society and to an economy that sets a premium on advanced job training, secular education, mass relocation in America, the transplantation of Torah institutions and so forth. Building up the land of Israel is only one item on this list. To be sure many of these issues occupied the attention of religious Zionists; R. Reines, for example, founded a yeshivah with 8 The Torah u-Madda Journal general studies. Yet it is safe to say that the Rav is speaking about his own dreams and projects rather than engaging in dispassionate histori- ography of events at the turn of the 20th century. It appears to me that the Rav shapes the story so as to minimize the gap between the religious Zionist vision he has come to share and the h. aredi background he reluctantly separated from. He acknowledges, in passing, that the world of 1902 was not as beautiful and as whole as he pretends: the old order was visibly breaking down. It was not as if tradi- tional Orthodoxy had reason to look at the present with equanimity, and only the visionary, inarticulate Joseph who sensed obscurely the cataclysms of secularism and persecution. The crisis was unmistakable. The question was whether the situation required drastic responses, and whether those policies could be justified halakhically and religiously. Traditionalists resisted new approaches because they did not expect the proposed remedies to justify the risks; or they might have believed that deviants from Orthodoxy could be written off and Judaism sustained by the hard core of the committed, standing alone; or they might hold that certain choices, such as joining the Zionist Congress led by secularists, were simply out of bounds. The Rav recognizes that the latter step was highly problematic and he uses the example of Chaim Weizman to illus- trate his own deep discomfort with the secular Zionist program. He does not, however, concede that for some of his traditionalist adver- saries of Zionism cooperation with “the wicked” was not only unpleas- ant and risky but strictly prohibited. The upshot of the Rav’s presentation defuses the antagonism of the Zionist controversy within Orthodoxy. The religious Zionists were not really “softer” on secularism than the rigorists. They did not accept compromise for its own sake. In the light of later events, the greatest enemies of the Zionist project might very well have recognized the rightness of Joseph’s lonely path. At a time when religious Zionism enjoyed its greatest preponderance of numbers and prestige vis-à-vis the h. aredim, the Rav simultaneously reinforced the confidence of religious Zionists, many of whom suffered from a lingering sense of ideological inferiority, and explained their opposition in terms that a triumphant religious Zionism could not dismiss with contempt. In situations like these, I believe that the Rav frequently saw himself as an emissary of traditionalist Orthodoxy to the modernists, testifying to the power and integrity of the world from which he emerged, and with which he identified, even as he vigorously proclaimed the legitimacy of the modernist positions he advocated. Shalom Carmy 9

Does the Rav’s discussion in this speech rescind the views set forth in the eulogy? To begin with, the Mizrachi address states that retrospective assessment can reveal that the preponderance of Gedolim did not make the best decision. They are not infallible. This does not tell us what to do prospectively. Try this analogy: medical diagnoses, based on the best available science, sometimes turn out to be mistaken. This demonstrates the fallibility of the medical profession; it does not constitute an argument against relying on the doctors in the future. Or imagine that halakhic authorities erroneously, in point of fact, but legitimately, in terms of their responsibility to halakhic method, rule that a husband is dead and his wife able to remarry. Likewise, even assuming that the history of the 20th century—epidemic secularism, the Holocaust, the political achievements of Zionism, and the educational achievements of religious Zionism—all justify, in hindsight, Joseph’s path, that does not imply that rabbinic judgment should be eschewed in the future. Much more important: nowhere in this lecture does the Rav say that we should prefer the insight of secular politicians to that of Torah mas- ters where the heart and soul of kelal Yisrael is touched. Nowhere does he express preference for the judgment of religiously observant politicians or even for that of middle rank talmidei h. akhamim disagreeing with the truly great. To the contrary, the Rav goes out of his way to emphasize that “Joseph” is as much a citizen of the republic of high-level Torah scholarship as his more numerous brethren. When he recalls the sleepless nights and long deliberation that brought him to religious Zionism, and presumably to other divergences from the standard h. aredi line (e.g. lib- eral arts education) that occurred well before his eulogy on R. H. ayyim Ozer, he says a great deal about the pain of loneliness and the heavy weight of soul-searching, but he says nothing about a putative sense of guilt at overturning some conventional doctrine of da‘at Torah articulat- ed in his earlier pronouncements. Thus there is nothing in the Rav’s statements here to show that he repented the ideas in the eulogy or that he now advocated the untrammeled sovereignty of lay leadership in sensitive areas of public policy. To suggest, as some liberals do, that recogni- tion of the “verdict of Heaven” in history effectively removes Torah authorities from public affairs, to be supplanted by the vox populi of lay leaders, elected or self-appointed, goes against the import of both essays. This is not to say that the differences between the two addresses do not reflect a change in attitude. The audience for the eulogy would have absorbed the clear message that gedolim should have a major role in the decision-making process and that enhancing their authority is a high 10 The Torah u-Madda Journal priority. No such exhortations characterize the Rav’s later utterances. There is enough public oral evidence that the Rav did not favor direct rabbinic intervention in political affairs, especially where they lack the requisite expertise to speak with authority. His 1967 ruling that decisions about possible territorial compromise in the land of Israel for the sake of peace should be made by experts in the field, rather than by rabbis, is currently the most discussed example of his outlook. While I am reluctant to rely on private comments, I am sure that many who enjoyed the Rav’s company can confirm my recollections of sarcasm on the subject of rabbis whose adherents encourage them to pontificate on matters of which they were inadequately informed. If his outlook can be inferred from his practice, it is appropriate for gedolei Torah who comment on public matters to recognize the complexity of human affairs and the existence of different informed opinions on most contested questions, and to modulate their voices accordingly. As noted earlier, such leadership inculcates the right “frame of reference” for individual and com- munal decisions rather than imposing such decisions from above. This model of teaching authority is alive and well in certain segments of our community, though not as much as one might wish, where laity and middle–level rabbinic scholars respectfully solicit and listen to multiple perspectives among their teachers, who, in turn, treat their audience and opponents with respect. But the details of seeking practical guidance from gedolim and how to learn from them in these areas are not to be derived from the Rav’s published writings.

Between R. Soloveitchik and R. Dessler

It may be illuminating to compare the Rav’s texts with one of the best- known briefs for the superior insight of gedolei Torah on worldly matters confronting the Jewish people, that of R. Eliyahu Dessler.7 R. Dessler, writing after World War II, is speaking to a community urgently in need of a defense of the superior status of Torah sages. Not only does he assert the incomparable quality of their insight. Having witnessed their conclaves, he appeals to the evidence of his eyes: “Whoever saw their gatherings . . . the scene was awesome, to see the greatness and depth of responsibility on their faces. Whoever was privileged to be in their presence at such a time, knew clearly that he saw the Shekhinah resting on their deeds” (75). Countering the view that contemporary gedolim do not possess the perspicuity associated with the rabbis of the Talmud, R. Dessler calls our Shalom Carmy 11 attention to the talmudic interpretation of the background to Haman’s persecutions. According to H. azal, the Jews of that generation were pun- ished for taking part in Ahasuerus’s feast. The proximate cause of the persecution, as recorded in the Bible, was Mordekhai’s refusal to bow down to Haman. To the untrained eye, the Biblical account sounds more rational. As R. Dessler puts it: “Had we been there, what would we have said? What caused the persecution? Is it that Mordekhai took the situation of the Jewish people lightly, or is it that nine years earlier there were those who took the sages’ prohibition lightly? (76)” Whoever is faithful to the Talmud must acknowledge that H. azal understood the deeper causation of Haman’s threat, despite its counter-intuitiveness. By the same token, the judgments of contemporary Torah authorities must be preferred to those of hoi polloi.8 R. Dessler contrasts the apparent explanation of Haman, based on visible causality, the kind of causal connection that might be identified by shrewd political observers, with the deeper causation discerned by the Rabbis, which traces events to their true spiritual roots. It is striking that the Rav, in his address to the Mizrachi, also distinguishes two approaches to historical reality. But for the Rav, it is the consensus of Torah authorities that evaluates reality by the light of everyday perceptions of the present moment, while “Joseph,” the maverick among his brethren, intuits the deeper direction of history. Thus the Rav enacts, in the story of Joseph, a theme that comes up, in a variety of forms, else- where in his thought: the tension between the rational, analytic tendency of intellectual activity, on the one hand, and the intuitive apprehen- sion of reality, on the other hand. It is also pertinent that the Rav’s discussion is not about causality—what led to the exile in Egypt or Haman, or to the breakdown of the Jewish religious community and the unprecedented eruption of anti-Semitism in the modern world. Instead he devotes his attention to the question of the needed response to historical challenges. Here we encounter, in passing, the approach to history, theodicy and repentance that takes center stage in Kol Dodi Dofek and other works. R. Dessler’s stress on the earnestness with which the pre-War gedolim shouldered their responsibility may be a tacit response to an implicit skepticism about the way consensus bodies like the Moetzes Gedolei Hatorah actually operated. The parallel formulation by the Rav, in his eulogy for R. H. ayyim Ozer, avoids vivid impressions in favor of the theological and historical claim that it is the bearers of the Z. iz. , the Torah elite, who are also the bearers of the H. oshen. The convincingness of this 12 The Torah u-Madda Journal assertion, for those not committed to it dogmatically, depends on the degree to which we can believe that the great rabbis have the greatest access to the heart and soul of the Jewish people. The Rav’s practical orientation towards the idea of da‘at Torah has been presented by some of his most faithful talmidim. R. Aharon Lichtenstein, for example, has written about the importance of such guidance.9 And R. Walter Wurzburger, in arguing that religious ethics requires personal examples, model individuals who embody Torah and are worthy of emulation, especially in areas where right conduct cannot be formulated in precise halakhic categories, has observed the relation between this insight and the special status of gedolim.10 Though we believe, following the Mishnah (Avot 3:1) that wisdom is the ability to learn from all human beings, how can we not grant pride of place to those who have seen Torah steadily and seen in whole (to adapt Matthew Arnold’s line)? The alternative is virtually unthinkable. The logic of this reasoning is compelling. It is hard to imagine a serious Orthodox Jew who would willingly dispense with the guidance of our greatest teachers in pursuing our spiritual destiny, either as individuals or as members of the community. It is out of the question to erect a high wall of separation between halakhic authority and public (or private) affairs. Yet these are arguments that compel the head rather than the heart. I wonder how successfully we could make the case for da‘at Torah today on the grounds the Rav set forth 65 years ago—that the Torah sages are the true voice of the Jewish heart, and that they not only speak to, but also speak for, the Jewish people. I wonder how many of us would even try. We sometimes try to pretend that the kelal Yisrael that really counts is coextensive with the Orthodox community, and then we can nostalgi- cally imagine ourselves part and parcel of a flourishing, authentic, har- monious community where the faithful congregation gathers around its rabbinic royalty as in the days of yore we never knew. We can thus nod happily at the thought of our gedolim with their fingers on the pulse of the Jewish people. This requires of us the illusion that the large majority of Jews who are distant from Torah and miz. vot, and who are likely to remain divided from us for the foreseeable future, is of no account to us. The “balkanization” (to use David Berger’s term) within contemporary Orthodoxy is itself too pronounced to let us forget that unity or fraternity does not characterize our own camp either. Yet despite every- thing, we resonate metaphysically and emotionally to the Rav’s halakhic vision of authority, combining the head with the heart. Therefore we are Shalom Carmy 13 attracted to those great individuals in whom we detect the promise of such intellectual integrity and encompassing concern—we can dream of the Sanhedrin or the Moetzes Gedolei Hatorah that would bring together R. H. ayyim Ozer, R. Kook, H. azon Ish, R. Moshe Feinstein, the late Lubavitcher rebbe and the Rav. That there is no way that such a consor- tium can become a reality under present social conditions is no small cause for sorrow.11

Notes

I appreciate comments by Jeffrey Saks, Bernard Stahl and especially Avi Shmidman.

1. References are to Divrei Hagut ve-Ha‘arakhah (Jerusalem, 1981)187-194. 2. See the statements cited in Zvi Vinman, Mi-Katowic ad He be-Iyyar (Jerusalem 1995), 46-58 and especially 52-56, implying sharp disagreement between R. Moshe and R. H. ayyim Ozer about R. H. ayyim Soloveitchik’s attitude towards Agudah. 3. See Shragai, Be‘ayot Aktualiyyot le-Or ha-Halakhah, ed. A. Bick (Jerusalem, 1993), 124-25. Translation is from R. Soloveitchik, Community, Covenant and Commitment: Selected Letters and Communications, ed. Nathaniel Helfgot (Jersey City, NJ, 2005), 206. 4. See interview in Morgen Journal 1/17/1955, entitled “The Great Sin of Our Generation that Undermines Our Judaism.” 5. See in Kovez. H. iddushei Torah (Jerusalem, n.d) 47-65. On the implied political theory, see Gerald Blidstein, “On the Jewish People in the Writings of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik,” in Exploring the Thought of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, ed. M. Angel (Hoboken, 1997), 321 n. 28. Given the Rav’s reluc- tance to publish at this stage in his career, especially in Halakhah, the histori- an cannot fail to remark on the prompt appearance of this lecture, delivered in June 1943, as a special supplement to HaPardes 17:11 (February 1944). Most of the papers in Kovez. H. iddushei Torah, which collects the Rav’s halakhic articles of the early years, were initiated by the Rav’s father, R. Moshe Soloveichik, at a time when the Rav was in search of a permanent educational position. This was no longer the case in the 1940’s. Perhaps the supplement was prompted by the public vindication (reported in HaPardes 17:10 [January 1944]: 23-27) that dispelled the cloud of vilification and false accusation under which the Rav had labored for three years. Perhaps, à la Kierkegaard, he wanted the publication of a philosophical work—Ish ha- Halakhah—to coincide with that of a halakhic one. Is it not likely, however, that the decision to publish the shiur on the calendar, and the Aggadta delivered at the same time, reflects an ideological agenda? 6. Citations are from the Hebrew H. amesh Derashot (Jerusalem. 1974) 7. Mikhtav me-Eliyahu (Jerusalem, 1963), I , 75ff. 8. I assume that R. Dessler, in the spirit of ein mikra yoz. ei mi-yedei peshuto, would not dismiss completely the “superficial” narrative supported by the Biblical text. But this issue is not raised in his essay. 14 The Torah u-Madda Journal

9. See his “Legitimation of Modernity: Classical and Contemporary,” in Engaging Modernity, ed. Moshe Sokol (Northvale, NJ, 1997), 3-34. 10. See his “Covenantal Imperatives” in Samuel K. Mirsky Memorial Volume, ed. Gersion Appel (New York, 1970), 3-12. 11. For general comments on the contemporary place of rabbinic authority in the public square, see, in addition to R. Lichtenstein's essay, my “Who Speaks for Torah—And How?” in Religious Zionism: After 40 Years of Statehood, ed. Shubert Spero and Yitzchak Pessin (Jerusalem, 1989) 156-172. For a survey of the literature see Lawrence Kaplan, “Daas Torah: A Modern Conception of Rabbinic Authority,” in Rabbinic Authority and Personal Autonomy," ed. Moshe Z. Sokol (Northvale, NJ, 1992), 1-60, updated in Bein Samkhut le-Otonomiyyah be-Masoret Yisrael, ed. Zeev Safrai and Avi Sagi (Jerusalem, 1997) 105-145.