Parsha Pearls: Parshas Bechukosai

 Giving Up the State Saves Lives
Eretz Yisroel Prefers Gentile Rule
The Sin of Questioning the Need for Exile
The Desolate Land

I will place your corpses on the corpses of your idols. (26:30)

The Gemora says (Sanhedrin 63b): “The righteous Eliyahu walked among the people dying of hunger in Jerusalem. He found a child who was swollen from hunger, lying in the garbage heaps. ‘From which family are you?’ he asked. ‘From such-and-such a family,’ he said. ‘Is there anyone surviving from that family?’ ‘No, except for me.’ ‘If I teach you something through which you will live, are you willing to learn it?’ ‘Yes,’ said the child. ‘Say every day, “Hear O Israel, Hashem is our G-d, Hashem is One.”’ The child said, ‘Be quiet, do not mention the name of Hashem!’ For his father and mother did not teach him that. Immediately, he took out his idol from his bosom and hugged it and kissed it until his stomach split, and his idol fell on the ground and he fell on top of it, to fulfill the verse, ‘I will place your corpses on the corpses of your idols.’”

The Brisker Rav used to repeat this passage often, and he would say, “This is the situation today. People see that rebelling against Hashem will not succeed, and that because of the establishment of the State we are suffering bitterly from our Arab neighbors. Every day people are killed and wounded, may Hashem have mercy. All the arms of the Zionists do not help to stop terror. And still people continue to support the State and think that it is the salvation of Hashem and the redemption of the Jewish people. They do not understand that this is a threat of destruction to the Jewish people!” (Uvdos Vehanhagos Leveis Brisk v. 4, 191)

In the same vein, the Satmar Rav said, “I heard that the religious Zionists announced that this war [of 1967] was necessary and obligatory according to Torah [in order to save the Jewish people from danger]. But it is obvious and known to all who see truth that all these troubles, including the danger of the war, came upon us only as a result of the existence of that Zionist state…it is the Zionist government that aroused the anger of the Arabs by provoking them in various ways, and if not for the stubbornness of its wicked leaders the danger of the war would never have been. And even now, if they were to give up their state and their government, there is no doubt that they would take Hashem’s anger away from the Jewish people. Had they done this, the entire calamity – the danger of the war and the loss of Jewish lives – would not have come upon them. And for every minute that they hold on to their power they are offending the Creator, blessed be He, with violation of the oaths and rebellion against the nations, which the holy Torah has forbidden and for which we have been warned of a severe punishment… And even naturally speaking, if they were to give up their government and Zionist state, there is no doubt that the United Nations would be able to find some way to prevent war, bloodshed and loss of Jewish lives.” (Al Hageulah V’al Hatemurah, Chapter 44)

Full Reading: https://torahjews.org/2023/11/26/parsha-pearls-parshas-bechukosai