On 3 Elul, remembering Rav Kuk

The Jewish calendar date today is 3 Elul. This marks the yahrzeit, or anniversary of death, of the first chief rabbi of Palestine, Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kuk, both a legendary and a controversial figure.

At his funeral, a man who later became an eminence in his own right, Rabbi Zelig Reuven Bengis, observed to the crowd of 50,000 mourners, to this effect: “There was more in this one head than in in the heads of this entire crowd combined.” Quite a statement, especially when one considers the vast halachic knowledge in Rabbi Bengis’ own head alone.

One might add — yes, Rav Kuk’s head; but also, his heart and soul. His poetry and hard-to-classify outpourings of the soul inspire, and confuse, people to this day.

Rav Kuk was a controversial figure. Universally esteemed for his polymathic knowledge of Talmud and codes, he was bitterly criticized by those who saw him as too lenient in his attitude toward the secular founders of the renewed Jewish society in Palestine. He did not condone their violations of Torah, but he did salute their dedication to the building of the land. Given that “violations of the Torah” in the early days of Zionism meant such practices as eating on Yom Kippur, Rav Kuk’s critics saw him as naive at best and destructive at worst.

Rav Kuk spoke of “groundless love” as the antidote to the “groundless hatred” that destroyed the Jewish community in the land of Israel in antiquity. The only way to win back the secular to the Torah, he said, was “groundless love.”

Among his most lasting contributions was in the form of one man, his disciple Rabbi Aryeh Levine, who became known as the tzaddik or righteous one of Jerusalem. Among Rabbi Levine’s countless acts of kindness was his steadfast commitment to visit, on Shabbos, the jails holding the opponents of British rule in Palestine. Rabbi Levine’s groundless love of people whose violence he did not necessarily agree with became the kernel of the great return to Torah study and observance among many secular circles in Israel decades later.

Among the most lasting contributions of Rabbi Levine was the marriage of his daughter to Rabbi Yosef Shalom Eliashiv, the great halachic leader of Jewry today, still strong at 101 in Jerusalem.

Rav Kuk, if opposed in his own time, is widely misunderstood decades later. There are those who read his writings, gushing with love for the land of Israel, and preach a most particularistic view of Judaism — and Jewish policy — today. In Rav Kuk’s name, settlement building anywhere, any time, in any way, at anyone else’s expense in the land of Israel is justified. Others read Rav Kuk’s writings, gushing with love of humanity, and preach a most universalistic view of Judaism — and Jewish policy — today. In Rav Kuk’s name, the rights of Palestinians, above all else, are justified.

The truth is, Rav Kuk believed radically in both the particularist and the universalist sides of Judaism, and it is extraordinarily difficult to say, decades after his death in 1935, what contemporary political positions he would hold.

What is crystal clear is that, upon perusing Rav Kuk’s strictly halachic writings, he exhibits the breath, the acuity, and the complete familiarity with the entire range of halachic sources, typically found in the first-rate decisors (posekim). In line with that commitment, it is worth noting that it was Rav Kuk, through his chief rabbinate, that originated the “status quo” which protects religious rights in the Jewish secular society of Israel even today.

There is a Denver connection to Rav Kuk. He visited here in 1924 as part of a three-man delegation raising funds for beleaguered East Europe yeshivot. One of the countless stories told about him actually occurred in Denver. This was shared by Rabbi Malin Galinsky, whose wife’s grandfather was the late Rabbi Ephraim Z. Halpern, who served small congregations on the West Side of Denver in the first decades of the 20th century.

When Rav Kuk descended from the train in 1924, someone approached him and asked: “Rebbe, why is there so much Sabbath desecration in the Holy City? It’s terrible!”

Rav Kuk responded: “I understand that here in Denver, there are an overwhelming number of tuberculars, very sick people.”

The response: “You don’t understand, Rebbe. They come here for the clear, clean, fresh air. It makes them better. It make them healthy.”

Rav Kuk said: “Same thing in the Holy City. The spiritually ill come to the Holy City to breathe its spiritually clear, clean, fresh air. It will heal them of their spiritual illnesses.”

A final Denver comment: 3 Elul also marks the yahrzeit of the late Rabbi Charles E. H. Kauvar, for 70 years the rabbi and emeritus at BMH — another lover of Zion, one of the few Americans who actually went to Palestine, in 1929, long before it was a Jewish state, to live and study Torah there for a year.

May their memories be a blessing!

Copyright © 2011 by the Intermountain Jewish News