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Ben Sheshet Le-Asor - Speeches and articles between two Wars (1979), now renamed "Olam Hayedidus" ("a world of friendship" i.e. between God and mankind) Rabbi Shlomo Wolbe

(A lecture at a summer camp of “Bnei Torah” for high-school students)

Sophocles the Greek describes, in a single poem, the greatness of the human being, and this is what he says: “Many things are awe-inspiring, but the most awe-inspiring of them all is the human being!”

He describes how the human being drains swamps, joins sea to land, makes deserts bloom, follows behind his plow through rain and storm, year after year, and so forth.

In our own days we can add to this description yet another great thing: that the human being dares—to fly to the moon. For if these are indeed the awe-inspiring powers of the human being that Sophocles describes, then the flight to the moon is among the most awe-inspiring of them. And it is not enough merely to marvel at the courage of spirit of the planners and the executors together. This event calls for renewed reflection on the old question of the greatness of the human being. Let us, for a short while, try to free ourselves from the immediate excitement and ask ourselves: has “the human being,” in an undertaking such as this and others like it, exhausted all that lies within his power for the building of the world?

Here—the Torah offers a penetrating critique of civilization, which strives to produce comfortable living conditions and to exhaust all sources of wealth and pleasure to their utmost; and these are the words of that critique (Duties of the Heart, Gate of Abstinence, chapter 2).

(That is, they came to see the settling of the world as their success.) In doing so, they turned away from the path of their ancestors—a path marked by sufficiency in this world, by contentment with what is necessary to live. The inclination then made pride in this alluring, together with the endless accumulation of wealth. It fostered in them the urge to grow ever stronger and to exalt themselves through it, until they sank into the depths of its seas.

And everything added to the ‘settling of the world’ added only to total destruction. They came to regard the evil of their way as though it were good. They made their bellies into gods; their Torah became their clothing, and their morality the fortification of their dwellings.”

That is to say: the world advances. We increasingly exploit the treasures of nature for the comfort of life—and all of this comes at the expense of the human being himself.

Civilization enlarges the world and diminishes the human being. It turns our gaze outward, while the inner life of the human person steadily contracts, steadily grows thin and impoverished.

Perhaps a human foothold on the moon will open new horizons for humanity’s development. Perhaps this is the beginning of the conquest of additional stars; perhaps worlds will be found with atmospheres that can sustain human life. Cities and states may yet be established there, and humanity may spread in ways that cannot yet be imagined. But will the human being be happier then?

Thus far, the greatest discoveries have brought almost more destruction than happiness. Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, came to see, at the end of his life, what a terrible weapon he had placed in the hands of the destructive forces within humanity. In an effort at atonement, he established prize funds to advance humanity in peace, in science, and in the arts—the Nobel Prizes. The discovery of the splitting of the atomic nucleus, too, gave birth to the creation of a bomb - (page 89)
האטום: המדינות האדירות אוגרות נשק נוקליארי המסוגל למחוק כל עקבות החיים מעל כדור הארץ. ניצול אנרגיית האטום לצרכי שלום מפגר בהרבה אחרי ניצולה בתעשיה המלחמתית.
בעומקה של כל ההתפתחות הציביליזטורית מונחת התפיסה כי כל האושר טמון באוצרות הטבע ובכוחות מחוץ לאדם, ושורש כל הרע והסבל שבעולם נעוץ גם-כי בחוץ: בצורת החיים, בארגון לקוי ובניצול בלתי־מספיק של אוצרות הטבע. אין כוונתנו כאן לשלול כל שיפור תנאי החיים החילוניים. ברצוננו רק להראות כי המביט החיצוני הזה בונה את העולם החיצוני על חשבון האדם עצמו.
כך מחפש המרקסיזם פתרון העיוות הסוציאלי במדינה קומוניסטית. הוא רואה שורש כל הרע בבעלות פרטית על „ההון היוצור”, כלומר המכונות והקרקע. המעביד, בעל המכונה או הקרקע, מנצל את הפועלים. העצה — הלאמת ההון היוצור. כשהמדינה תהיה הבעלים על כל המכונות וקרקעות, שוב לא יהיו מעמדות, כל האזרחים יהיו פקידי המדינה, והיא תחלק את הרווחים בצורה צודקת. - כהיום אנו עדים להגשמת התיאוריה זו ברוסיה הסובייטית, וידוע משטר זה לשימצה בדיכוי ורודנות, בשחיתות ושקר — והכל בהסוואה של „צדק סוציאלי”.
ואין פלא בדבר. שורש הרע אינו נעוץ בארגון לקוי של החברה או בסיבות אחרת מחוץ לאדם. שורש הרע נמצא בתוך האדם עצמו, וכל שיטה שאינה מתחשבת עם עובדה יסודית זו — סופה להיכשל! המרקסיזם החליף את הבעלים הפרטי על הון הייצור בבעלים הכללי — המדינה, אך בשורש הרע שבאדם לא נגע כלל, ולכן לא היתה כאן אלא התהפכות מצד אל צד: במקום שהבעלים הפרטי יעביד וינצל את הפועל, מנצלת ומדכאת מעתה הממשלה בשם המדינה את האזרח, ואולי בצורה עוד יותר אכזרית. הרי כל הרגשת העצמה וגאות־הבעלות שהתחלקה בעבר בין הרבה בעלי בתי־חרושת והשקעות, מתרכזת עתה בלבם של קומץ אנשים, הצמרת השלטת על אוכלוסיה עצומה! כל המהפכה הסוציאליסטית לא הפילה שער ארצה מכל הגאות ויצר־השליטון אשר בלב האדם, היא רק ריכוזה יצרם אלה קומץ אנשים!
הרי השאיפה הבלעדית לתקן עולם מבחוץ, מבלי להסיר את הרע שבפנים האדם — לא רק שאינה מתקנת הרע משרשו אלא היא עוד מחזקת את האדם עצמו.
— כל אדם מחפש חוויות גדולות מחוצה לו; הוא מקווה כי חויה גדולה תרומם אותו ותבטל הקטנוניות שבלבו. בידי הוה עובדה: הייתי פעם על הר גבוה מאוד. בעמדי על הפסגה ובהסתכלי בנוף העצום מסביב, הרים עטופי שלג מימי בראשית, מרחב מרחיב עין, אמרתי לעצמי: במעמד כזה בודאי יתבטלו בקרבי כל המדות הקטנטנות, כל הקפידות היום־יומיות — כל זה בודאי בטל מעתה ונפל ממני כנגד בלוי, ולא יחזור עוד ללבי, ומעתה אהגה רק בדברים גדולים ואמיתיים! ובו ברגע מששתי בעצמי עם אמנם השתני והייתי לאיש אחר — ונוכחתי לדעת, כי בפנימיותי לא השתנה מאומה, נשארתי אותו אדם קטן שהייתי; רק החויה הגדולה של נוף נהדר זה חיפתה לרגע על הקטנוניות שבלבי!

the Atom. The great powers stockpile nuclear weapons capable of erasing every trace of life from the face of the earth. The harnessing of atomic energy for peaceful purposes lags far behind its use in the machinery of war.

At the very heart of the entire civilizational project lies an assumption: that all happiness is found in nature’s resources and in forces outside the human being; and that the root of all evil and suffering in the world likewise lies outside—in our way of life, in flawed social organization, and in the insufficient exploitation of nature’s treasures. Our intention here is not to deny the value of improving secular living conditions. We wish only to show that this outward-looking gaze builds up the outer world at the expense of the human being himself.

Thus Marxism seeks a remedy for social distortion in a communist state. It locates the root of all evil in private ownership of the “means of production”—that is, the machines and the land. The employer, the owner of the machine or the soil, exploits the workers. The solution, then, is the nationalization of the means of production. When the state becomes the owner of all machines and lands, classes will disappear; all citizens will become employees of the state; and it will distribute profits in a just manner.

And today we are witnessing the realization of this theory in Soviet Russia—and that regime is notorious for oppression and tyranny, for corruption and falsehood, all under the banner of “social justice.”

This is no surprise. The root of evil is not lodged in society’s faulty arrangements, nor in some other cause outside the human being. The root of evil lies within the human being himself—and any system that does not reckon with this fundamental fact is destined to fail. Marxism replaced the private owner of the means of production with a collective owner—the state—but it did not touch the root of evil within man at all. And so what occurred was merely a reversal from one side to the other: instead of the private owner working and exploiting the laborer, the government—now in the name of the state—exploits and oppresses the citizen, perhaps even more cruelly.

For the entire feeling of power and the arrogance of ownership, which in the past had been distributed among many factory owners and investors, is now concentrated in the hearts of a handful of people—the ruling elite over a vast population. The socialist revolution did not topple a single hair from the head of human pride and the lust to rule lodged in the human heart; it merely concentrated those drives in the hands of a small group.

Indeed, the exclusive aspiration to repair the world from without—without removing the evil within—does not merely fail to correct evil at its root; it strengthens it.

Every person seeks great experiences outside himself. He hopes that a great experience will lift him up and cancel the pettiness in his heart. I can testify to this from experience: once I stood on a very high mountain. As I stood on the summit and looked out at the immense landscape around me—snow-covered peaks from time immemorial, a vast expanse stretching the eye—I said to myself: in a moment like this, surely all my small-minded traits will dissolve; all the daily irritations and grievances—surely all of this has now fallen away from me like worn-out clothing and will never return to my heart. From now on I will think only great and true thoughts!

And at that very moment, as I spoke to myself—so it seemed—I changed and became a different person. But I soon realized: inwardly, nothing had changed at all. I remained the same small person I had been; only the great experience of that splendid view had, for a moment, covered over the pettiness in my heart. (page 90)

He is still the human being: even if his peak reaches the heavens, even if his head touches the clouds in some outward experience—he nevertheless remains the same human being, with the same traits and impulses. So where is the repair of the human being? And where is the repair of the world?

II

We now wish to present a different image of the “awe of the human being”—one that, at first glance, is capable of stirring amazement. We find the following in the words of the Sages (Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer, ch. 31; Yalkut Shimoni, Vayera §98; cited by Rashi on Exodus 4:28):

“Abraham arose early in the morning (for the binding of Isaac), and took Ishmael, Eliezer, and Isaac, and saddled the donkey—this is the donkey, the offspring of the she-donkey created at twilight, as it is said (Genesis 22:3): ‘And Abraham arose early in the morning and saddled his donkey.’
This is the donkey upon which Moses rode when he came to Egypt, as it is said (Exodus 4:20): ‘And Moses took his wife and his sons and mounted them upon the donkey.’
And this is the donkey upon which David is destined to ride, as it is said (Zechariah 9:9): ‘Rejoice greatly, daughter of Zion; shout, daughter of Jerusalem—behold, your king comes to you, righteous and victorious, humble and riding upon a donkey, upon a colt, the foal of a she-donkey.’”

Not long ago, a lecturer at Bar-Ilan University mocked this passage, saying—approximately: How can the Messiah redeem the modern world if he appears in so utterly unmodern a form, riding on a donkey?
That lecturer’s advanced education did not suffice to allow him even a brief glance beyond the prophetic metaphor—or at the very least, to grasp that profound depths are at stake here!

For this rabbinic teaching points to something remarkable. Every person of faith understands that the Sages did not intend to say that this donkey is some ancient creature, stretching its lifespan from the dawn of creation until the coming of the redeemer. What is astonishing is this: it is precisely these three who ride upon this donkey—Abraham our father, Moses our teacher, and the righteous Messiah. And this is no trivial matter. Abraham our father, who founded the people of the Lord upon faith; Moses our teacher, who brought the Torah down from heaven; and the final redeemer—this is the point of the teaching: these three stand on the same spiritual plane.

Of Abraham our father it is said that he “caused the Name of the Blessed One to be proclaimed by every creature” (see Genesis 21:33 with Rashi there; and 14:17 with Rashi). All the inhabitants of the world gathered in the Valley of Shaveh—the Valley of the King—and there crowned him as a prince of God over them.

Of Moses our teacher it is said:

“See, I have made you a god to Pharaoh, and Aaron your brother shall be your prophet. You shall speak all that I command you, and Aaron your brother shall speak to Pharaoh, that he send the children of Israel out of his land” (Exodus 7:1–2).

From where did both of them merit such absolute authority over their contemporaries—and even over the king of the mightiest empire of their age? And the King Messiah—how will he rule over the entire world, humble and riding upon a donkey? How did the world submit to Abraham our father? How did Pharaoh submit to Moses our teacher? And how will the entire world submit to the King Messiah?

There is no doubt that a secret lies here. The Sages hinted at it when they said that all three are “riders upon the donkey”—and not just any donkey, but one created at twilight on the eve of the Sabbath. For everything created at that moment—such as the well, the staff, and others (see Avot 5:5)—serves as a bridge between nature and that which lies beyond nature.

“Rider from Zion, absolute dominion”—in the sense of “Rider of the heavens in your aid” (Deuteronomy 33:26). The donkey here symbolizes matter and nature as a whole. And the teaching comes to say that these three (page 91) mastered matter and nature in their entirety.

Thus Abraham our father became the “father of a multitude of nations,” whose superiority all recognized. Thus Moses our teacher became “a god to Pharaoh.” And thus the King Messiah will be—Messiah.

“Who are the kings?—the sages,” said the Sages (Gittin 62a). That is to say: to some degree, kingship is a defining trait of every true Torah scholar. When Rabbi Judah Halevi describes, in the Kuzari, the nature of the Torah-true pietist, he writes:

“The pious individual is one who rules—obedient to his senses and to his psychological and physical powers, directing them with disciplined governance, as it is said: ‘One who rules his spirit is greater than one who conquers a city.’ Such a person is fit to rule, for if he were a sovereign over a state, he would govern it with justice just as he governs his body and soul.” (Kuzari III:5)

We find examples of this throughout history: how the great of the world submit themselves before a truly great Jew. Let us cite a few.

The prophet Jonah fled toward Tarshish and refused to go to Nineveh to deliver the prophetic message. He knew that the nations of the world were close to repentance, that they would accept his rebuke, and that this would bring accusation upon Israel (see Yalkut Shimoni on Jonah 1). Indeed, when he was ultimately forced to go to Nineveh, they repented profoundly.

How could Jonah be so certain that the nations were close to repentance? Let us imagine today a prophet of God arriving in Moscow and rebuking the leaders of the Kremlin to repent—could he possibly imagine that his words would have any effect? And yet this was Jonah’s certainty. This can only be explained as the secret of the prophet of God: absolute knowledge, without a trace of doubt, that a great city will submit to his rebuke.

When Alexander of Macedon saw Shimon the Righteous, “he descended from his chariot and bowed before him. His attendants said to him: ‘A great king such as yourself bows before this Jew?’ He replied: ‘The image of this man goes before me and grants me victory in battle’” (Yoma 69a; Megillat Ta’anit, ch. 9).

Antoninus, the Roman emperor, was a disciple of Rabbi Judah the Prince and would come to him daily to study Torah (see Avodah Zarah 10b). It was Antoninus who said: “I know that even the smallest among you can resurrect the dead”—that the least of the Tannaim possesses the power of reviving the dead.

How wondrous it is to read the Ramban’s disputation before the King of Spain and the highest officials of the realm. With what fearless clarity he defended the faith of the Torah! And what he wrote in the introduction to his commentary on the Torah—“The God from whom alone I fear will save me on the day of wrath”—he demonstrated in practice in that very disputation.

The Vilna Gaon, too, was once imprisoned for his efforts—together with the leaders of the Vilna community—to save a young man from forced conversion. When he was brought before the gentile court, wrapped in his tallit and tefillin as was his constant custom, the radiance of his face transformed enemies into admirers. The judges received him with gracious countenances, and within a few hours he was released from prison (Bezalel Landau, The Pious Genius of Vilna, p. 251, citing Ruach Eliyahu in the name of R. M. A. Bloch, in the name of R. Aharon Kotler). (page 92)

— When the Chafetz Chaim was already over ninety years old, he traveled to Warsaw in order to influence the Minister of Education to rescind a decree mandating secular studies in the chederim. The Chafetz Chaim never wore the robes of rabbinic authority; he dressed simply, like an ordinary Jew. He spoke to the minister in Yiddish, and when those accompanying him wished to translate his words into Polish, the minister signaled that he already understood the Chafetz Chaim’s intent. He promised to annul the decree—and indeed, he kept his word.

When the Chafetz Chaim took leave of him and blessed him, the hardened Polish official burst into tears, deeply moved by the blessing. All the years I merited to be in the presence of our master, Rabbi Yerucham, of blessed memory, I never saw in him a single superfluous gesture; his entire being was kingship. And this is the essence of a truly great person: kingship. Before such inner sovereignty—people submit.

Rabbi Elazar bar Tzadok said: We would leap over coffins of the dead to greet the kings of Israel—and he did not mean only the kings of Israel, but even the kings of the nations of the world; for one who merits it can distinguish between Israel and the kings of the nations (Berakhot 19b). How wondrous it is for one who has once seen kings of the world amid all the splendor that surrounds them, and who has also merited to encounter the great ones of Israel—he can truly discern where genuine kingship resides.

The secret of the greatness of the Torah giants lies in their absolute mastery over themselves. And the more a person merits such self-mastery, the more the powers of his soul are revealed within him; and even the eyes of those who behold him are illuminated—to see the truth and to sense what their obligation is in this world.

IV

This journey through the ages serves, in some measure, to highlight the immense spiritual power latent within the human being when he refines himself through Torah. The light that bursts forth from his heart is so great that even nations feel it—enemies are transformed into friends. Yet all of these examples still represent only a miniature form of kingship compared to these three: Abraham our father, Moses our teacher, and the righteous Messiah—each of whom exerted influence upon the world from one end to the other.

(And this matter stands at the very foundation of our faith. Were I asked what my “credo” is, I would say: I believe in the greatness of the human being! I believe that the human being is so great that he can stand before his Creator and hear Him speak to him—that is prophecy!—and speak to his Creator—that is prayer! And the greatness of the people of Israel reached such a height that the entire nation stood at Mount Sinai and heard the Ten Commandments from the mouth of God in prophecy. And from within this greatness, the human being can repair himself, his surroundings, and the entire world.)

In God—all human beings believe. In the greatness of the human being—not everyone believes. That a person can strive to reach a living relationship with his Creator; that not only can his Creator reveal Himself to him and speak to him, but that a person can walk before God in the land of the living, and the world may dwell before God (Psalms 61:8)—this is our faith.

And behold, the world has reached a crisis, and it is not clear how it will escape it. In our holy land we have seen open miracles and daily divine kindness—yet peace remains far away. Even so, our faith remains whole: all that is needed is one person, one great soul, who will appear and reveal to us the full power of the truly great human being.

All of humanity is waiting only for a vision of the human being and his awe-inspiring greatness—not the wonders he performs outwardly (those have not saved humanity!)—but rather… (page 93)

The awe-inspiring powers lie hidden within the depths of the soul and heart of the truly great human being. One such person is enough to redeem us—and for this we wait.

“I believe with perfect faith in the coming of the Messiah,” and even though he may delay, I wait for him every day that he may come.

Yet even without this, the awe-inspiring power of the human being is sufficient for each and every one of us. Let each of us now reveal the treasures of kindness within our hearts, and the flame of faith; let us sharpen our senses to enlarge our deeds—each person in his own place and within his own surroundings. For after all, “it is incumbent upon us to ascribe sovereignty to the Master of all, to give greatness to the Creator of the Beginning.”

Whose greatness? The Blessed One is great even without us. But it is upon us to offer our own greatness in the service of our God.

The awe of the human being lies within his inner life—
let us reveal its light through our deeds. (page 94)