Love of Eretz Yisroel vs Jewish Nationalism | Life questions with Rabbi W - Status Island

Hi, and welcome to the Life Questions of Rabbi W, brought to you by the Status Island.com. You can submit a question by emailing me Rabbi W at [email protected] or by messaging the Status Island at 718-787-8217. The question this week is as follows. We want our children to grow up yearning for Eretz Yisrael, davening for the Geulah, and appreciating its Kedusha. But today, they're exposed to a lot of Israeli culture and nationalism. How do we help them distinguish between Ahavas Eretz Yisrael and Zionism? So, first of all, I have to say that I agree with the questioner. It's a problem. We love Eretz Yisrael, but our children today are exposed to a lot of Zionism and a lot of Jewish nationalism, which is very different from Torah. Now, if you have a problem with the premise of the question, I can't help you. There's a Q&A from Rabbi Miller where he said that a woman asked him about the Holocaust. Now, Rabbi spoke about the Holocaust a lot of times, and he said that it was a punishment for the secularization of Judaism. And he said that a woman once asked me about it, and I told her, "Come back in 20 years. Keep coming to my Shiurim for 20 years, and then ask me the question." And he explained, he said, "You have to have a certain background before you're willing to accept an answer. It doesn't mean there's anything wrong with you. It doesn't mean there's anything wrong with your question. It doesn't mean that I can't answer your question. But in order for you to be able to understand the answer, in order for you to be able to make out of all the answer, you have to keep coming here for 20 years." That's what Rabbi Miller said to this woman. So, that's really for people who who don't who aren't willing to accept the question. What do you mean? What's wrong? Everybody's Jewish. It's all good. So, you have to keep coming for 20 years. I was present this week somewhere where there was a a discussion about physics between two college-educated uh people. It was related to Torah physics, astronomy. And there was somebody there, Thomas Huchin, had no idea what they were talking about. He said, "Maybe you could explain to me this thing." They said, "I'm sorry. I I we can't explain it to you. There's nothing It's not a It doesn't mean that you're dumb because you don't understand it. And it doesn't mean that we don't understand it well enough to explain it to you. You You just missing an education." So, if you don't like the question, it's uh it's not It's not because there's something wrong with you or there's something wrong that I can't answer. I can answer, but you got to give me 20 years. That's my my first point over here. Now, I want to agree that the exposure that we have today is a problem. The The There's so much from media today, ostensibly from media, and they make heroes out of people who at best disregard Torah misinai completely. And at worst, you know, act with malice against the Bnei Torah and the Bnei Yeshivas and the Olam HaTorah. And to make these people to be our heroes is a big problem because either we respect the Torah or we respect what's anti-Torah. And it's a it's a it's an issue. It's an issue. So, that's the problem. That's the problem. The question is what's the solution? And the solution to all questions of chinuch is that you have to have it yourself. If you There's a certain lesson that you want to pass on to your kids, there's a certain hashkafa, there's a certain ideal that you want to pass on to your kids, the first thing is you have to have it yourself. Now, Ahavas Yisrael, that's something we grew up with. That's with something that in previous generations was a given. I remember how my grandmother, Bobby Wolhandler, she was a talmida of Rebbetzin Shulem Neider, the first uh from the first group. And when she used to talk about Eretz Yisrael, it was everything it was Eretz Yisrael. I remember my grandfather once got something years before he had he got a package from Eretz Yisrael. And it came in a big envelope, and he saved the envelope. He had it on top of his shul and shonk. He would take it down and show us this envelope came from Eretz Yisrael. So, when you have something like that, you you really hold it, so it gets passed on to your kids. You see your your children see how excited you are when Eretz Yisrael gets mentioned, it it gets passed on to them. That's how any hashkafa goes. If if you're strong with this hashkafa, it's going to get communicated to your kids. You don't have to worry about it. Like the Rashba writes about it should be on your heart. And he explains, and it's going to get passed on to your kids. If this is something that you care deeply about, and it's really on your heart, and it's on your mind all the time, don't worry about it. It's going to get passed on to your kids. Now, it's interesting that in between when I got the question and now when I'm recording the answer, my daughter asked me, she said that somebody in her class said that her father said you're not allowed to say Israel, you have to say Eretz Yisrael. Why? So, I told her very simple. Because just like you understand that we don't say Saturday, Saturday is a valid it's a valid word. You can say, "Well, this week we're going to for Saturday for the weekend We're we're traveling away for the weekend because it's the Saturday where we read the haftorah of Nachamu. She started laughing. She She knew it's funny. What do you mean? It's Shabbos. It's Shabbos kodesh. So, Eretz Yisrael is the same thing. If it's Eretz Yisrael, it's not Israel. What What are you? A Palestinian? What are you? An American? Is it It's Israel, Israeli? It's Eretz Yisrael. It's our holy land. Now, it happens to be when we're talking about the Israeli army, we're talking about the Israelis. We're talking about the Tzionim. We're not talking about Eretz Yisrael. But, if the distinction is clear in your head, if you And it should be clear. You daven three times a day in Shmoneh Esrei. We're constantly talking about these things. We're talking about Yerushalayim, we're talking about Eretz Yisrael, we're talking about the geulah. Sameach Tzion b'vinyan shalem b'korov yameinu Constantly, every day we're talking about exactly these things about ahavas Eretz Yisrael and yearning for Mashiach. This is what we're talking about. And we're also talking about the birkas hamazon. We say v'al hamishkon v'al ha'mikdash v'al ha'kodesh, the whole bracha over there. So, if we concentrate on our own words when we're saying Shmoneh Esrei, we have the answer to the to the question. So, in summation, there's no question that as much as possible, we should try to limit the exposure to the frum media that praises the apikorsim and that makes it as if all Jews are Israelis, as if it's all one thing. We should try to limit that for our children as much as we can. But, at the end of the day, it's not in our hands. It's it's ubiquitous. It's all over the place. This is This is who This is where we are right now. So, at least if you for yourself are very clear what Eretz Yisrael means to you, what ahavas Eretz Yisrael, what geulah means to you, if you're clear by yourself, and you know what Zionism means to you, and what kabalas Torah means, and what being against the Tyro means then there's no question that it's going to be communicated to your children and may we have much nachos from our children and we should be so excited to be mechanic them to the true ideals of the Tyro.