5731

Greeting and Blessing:

I am in receipt of your recent letter, as well as the previous correspondence.

Since you have written several times on the matter of Yishuv Eretz Yisrael, our Holy Land, also quoting halachic sources deeming it a mitzvah, it is surprising that you do not at the same time make any mention of what activities you are engaged in to help produce conditions which would truly and openly reflect the holiness of our Holy Land. For, as you surely know, there are whole portions and sections in Chumash which greatly emphasize the sacred nature of our Holy Land, demanding that the Jews living there conduct themselves in accordance with G-d’s holy Torah and holy mitzvot^.1

As for your mentioning the fact that according to the opinion of several poskim it is a mitzvah to live in Eretz Yisrael, surely you know that all poskim agree that there are 612 additional mitzvot to be observed by Jews everywhere, and especially by those already living in the Holy Land. Indeed, those who are already there and are fulfilling the mitzvah of living in Eretz Yisrael should surely concentrate on the rest of the 612 mitzvot — those which apply nowadays, of course, the period after the destruction of the Bet Hamikdash. Yet, in all your letters, I have not found any indication as to your efforts in this direction, nor have I heard about any such activities on your part from other sources that report to me about activities aimed at spreading and strengthening Yiddishkeit in Tel Aviv.

It is of course possible that you are practicing hatzne’a lechet in these matters. However, since I see that you are a letter writer, surely you could do a great deal, through the writing of letters to urge and encourage the uncompromising adherence to the Torah and mitzvot, first in the Tel Aviv area itself, since “the poor of thy city come first,’’² and then over an even wider range. We have been assured that, “words from the heart penetrate the heart,”³ and eventually have an effect, especially if backed by a living example.

Even if you should not be successful in the first round, I see that you are the persevering kind, since you have written to me a second and a third time, although your first letter had apparently not produced tangible results. Moreover, there is the mitzvah of hoche'ach tochiach-“ even one hundred times.”⁴ This is interpreted in many sources, not as a figure of speech, but literally. That is to say, even if one has failed 99 times, he has still to make one more attempt, exerting himself no less fully than before.

It is also self-evident that if one has begun to be active in the spreading and strengthening of Yiddishkeit, there is undoubtedly still a great deal to be done, all the more so, considering that Yishuv Eretz Yisrael is so closely linked with the observance of the mitzvot, as is also clearly underscored in the prayer which we have been saying for thousands of years — “Because of our sins we have been exiled from our land.”⁵ This clearly indicates that every Jew who wants to help nullify the result, (exile from our land), must first of all nullify the cause, (our sins).

In light of the above, I would indeed appreciate your letting me know that you have become active along the lines indicated, and with the utmost energy, and that you are going from strength to strength⁶ in this direction, since all matters of goodness and holiness should be on the ascendancy, particularly those so directly associated with our Holy Land.

With blessing,