Who among us hasn’t heard, at least once in his life, the expression (chant, mantra, demand) of we want Moshiach now? On paper, at least, it’s beautiful, concise, and to the point because in four words we have the twelfth of the Rambam’s thirteen Ikkurim distilled to perfection, and nonetheless it tends to grate on many of us.
Why so?
It could have something to do with the incessant repetition, ad nauseum. Or perhaps it’s because in certain circles it seems to be the sole concern of those most animated by it, with no second or third concerns hanging out in the bullpen waiting to be summoned to round out the breadth and depth of one’s Yiddishkeit, with breadth and depth being defined as we want Moshiach now.
And then there’s emunah.
It is such a yesod that the Rambam counts it as the very first mitzvah in his Sefer HaMitzvos. The Ramban goes a step further and posits that emunah is bottom line, and that it’s the foundation of all of the mitzvos, and therefore can’t be counted as one of them.
And wouldn’t you know it, there’s a group that takes these two Rishonim at their word, and puts emunah at the epicenter of their understanding of Yiddishkeit. And it just so happens that emunah also occupies most of the space between the circumference of that understanding and its epicenter.
And although they have a firm grasp on this foundation of foundations known as emunah, their articulation of it also tends to grate on us a little for the same reasons that were put forth as concerns Moshiach.
Yishuv Eretz Yisroel is also a very great mitzvah, and for a very large group it has become the central focus of their lives.
Over thirty years ago, Rav Nachman Bulman z”l told a cousin of mine, who at the time was one of those who were living in Hadassah Hospital in Hevron, that from both a hashkafic/halachic point of view it was a risky proposition for Gush Emunim (the name at that time of the movement to settle Yehudah and the Shomron) to make settling the Land the exclusive focal point of their Yiddishkeit. If they were ever, chas v’shalom, detached from the Land, he said, some would give up their Yiddishkeit altogether. And this is exactly what happened to a number of them after Korban Gaza. No longer being tethered to the Land that had been the center of their Jewish lives, religiously speaking they took a walk.
Query: So what exactly are the rest of us riding?
The vast majority of us are not riding a one trick pony, because its defects and limitations are all too apparent. But at least it’s a living, breathing expression of Yiddishkeit, even if it is too narrowly focused. As we have already said, each trick represents a fundamental concept of Judaism.
But in our aversion to the tumult that is made concerning these inyonim (and a number of others also), in that the drums that beat for them perhaps beat a little too loudly, many of us tend to forget the centrality of these concepts. We take a dive on these inyonim in toto, eliminating almost all references to them from polite discussion lest we be suspected of latent sympathies with the aforementioned partisans for emunah, Moshiach, and Yishuv Eretz Yisroel.
I recently heard the best shiur ever on Moshiach, and the maggid shiur began with a disclaimer that just because the subject of the shiur was Moshiach, the audience shouldn’t think that he (the speaker)was a member of a certain group.
Rabbi Dov Halperin: Waiting for Moshiach.
So this is what we’ve come to. In our stampede toward the exits away from the groupies extolling emunah, Moshiach, Yishuv Eretz Yisroel, and the like, all too many of us have eschewed a one trick pony only to settle instead for a no trick pony, devoid of much of the essence of Judaism.
