There is a very famous “Meshech Chochma” on this week’s second parsha, Bechukotai. On the Tochecha in Vayikra (26:44), R. Meir Simcha of Dvinsk 1843-1926) adds the following philosophical gloss:
“If the Jew thinks that Berlin is Jerusalem … then a raging storm wind will uproot him by his trunk and subject him before a faraway gentile nation… a tempest will arise and spread its roaring waves, and swallow, and destroy, and flood forth without pity. Therefore, you will not be calm, nor shall there be a resting place for the sole of your foot is a blessing, for as long as the Jewish People are uncomfortable in exile, they will yearn to return to their homeland.”
Twenty-five years before the Shoah, Rabbi Meir Simcha was a strong supporter of the settlement of Eretz Yisrael and greeted the Balfour Declaration with enthusiasm. He also believed that in order for a Rabbi to be a true leader of his community, he must be fluent in the language of the land. In this famous near-prophetic passage written before 1926, he presents a brilliant theory of Jewish history in the Diaspora and asserts that those who forget their origins, thinking “Berlin is Jerusalem,” are doomed to destruction.
The big question, however, is whether the Meshech Chochma intended “Berlin” in a geographical sense, or in an ideological sense? Perhaps, his diatribe is against the liberalized Berlin-philosophy – whether this was in Germany or, indeed, in (modern-day) Eretz Yisrael?
Any thoughts?
The Meshech Chochma (a commentary on the Torah written about 1870) wrote on the tochacha in Leviticus that German unreligious Jewry was making Germany and its culture their idolatry, and it was making Berlin for them what Jerusalem is to Torah Jewry, and that the punishments written in the Torah will come against them from Berlin for their defection from Torah and its commandments. The unreligious German Jew stood by his belief in the culture, civilization and alleged progress of Germans. Hashem cut them down and cast their carcasses on the idolatry which they left Hashem for!
The latter warned, 25 years before the Holocaust, that the day would come, in which “the Israelite [in diaspora] will forget his origins and be counted as citizen [of the world]… Will think that Berlin is Jerusalem… Then a stormy wind will come, uproot him and subject him before a faraway gentile nation.” (Meshech Chochma, Vayikra 26).
“This is the way of our people, that when they enter a foreign land they are bereft of Torah scholars from the trials and travails of persecution and expulsion, but then the G-dly spirit awakens within them to return to their roots. They learn, teach Torah, do wonders, until the glory of Torah is restored… Soon they begin to say our forefathers have given us falsehood, as they forget their origins and become as full citizens, abandoning the teachings of their faith, learning foreign languages, learning from ‘kilul’ and not ‘tikkun’, thinking Berlin is Yerushalayim… Then a storm will arise to rip them from their roots…”
Perhaps the answer lies in the condition of exile itself. History has shown that the Shechina follows the Jewish People into exile, helping us, and the Torah, to survive. The great danger is comfort in exile, when galut, an undesired existential state, becomes “Diaspora,” which describes geographic location neutrally, even advantageously. In the scathing words of Meshech Chochmah (R. Meir Simcha of Dvinsk 1843-1926) on the Tochecha in Vayikra (26:44):
“If the Jew thinks that Berlin is Jerusalem … then a raging storm wind will uproot him by his trunk … a tempest will arise and spread its roaring waves, and swallow, and destroy, and flood forth without pity.”
Therefore,
you will not be calm, nor shall there be a resting place for the sole of your foot
is a blessing, for as long as the Jewish People are uncomfortable in exile, they will yearn to return to their homeland.
“If the Israeli (i.e. Jew) thinks that Berlin is Jerusalem … then a raging storm wind will uproot him by his trunk… a tempest will arise and spread its roaring waves, and swallow, and destroy, and flood forth without pity…”.
This statement, ‘Berlin is my Jerusalem’ was introduced by Reform Jewry.
However, this warning of the Meshech Chochma is relevant to us all. No matter where one stands on the Jewish spectrum, there is a danger of forgetting Jerusalem to some extent.
Rabbi Meir Simcha was a strong supporter of the settlement of Eretz Yisrael and greeted the Balfour Declaration with enthusiasm. He also believed that in order for a Rabbi to be a true leader of his community, he must be fluent in the language of the land. In a famous near-prophetic passage written before 1926, he presents a brilliant theory of Jewish history in the Diaspora and asserts that those who forget their origins, thinking “Berlin is Jerusalem”, are doomed to destruction. Elsewhere he writes forebodingly that a Jew should willingly give his life to sanctify G-ds name, because it is natural that when one is confronted with an opposing force, his essence comes to the fore.
The Meshech Chochma (a commentary on the Torah written about 1870) wrote on the tochacha in Leviticus that German unreligious Jewry was making Germany and its culture their idolatry, and it was making Berlin for them what Jerusalem is to Torah Jewry, and that the punishments written in the Torah will come against them from Berlin for their defection from Torah and its commandments. The unreligious German Jew stood by his belief in the culture, civilization and alleged progress of Germans. Hashem cut them down and cast their carcasses on the idolatry which they left Hashem for!
The latter warned, 25 years before the Holocaust, that the day would come, in which “the Israelite [in diaspora] will forget his origins and be counted as citizen [of the world]… Will think that Berlin is Jerusalem… Then a stormy wind will come, uproot him and subject him before a faraway gentile nation.” (Meshech Chochma, Vayikra 26).
“This is the way of our people, that when they enter a foreign land they are bereft of Torah scholars from the trials and travails of persecution and expulsion, but then the G-dly spirit awakens within them to return to their roots. They learn, teach Torah, do wonders, until the glory of Torah is restored… Soon they begin to say our forefathers have given us falsehood, as they forget their origins and become as full citizens, abandoning the teachings of their faith, learning foreign languages, learning from ‘kilul’ and not ‘tikkun’, thinking Berlin is Yerushalayim… Then a storm will arise to rip them from their roots…”
