Rav Yehoshua Eichenstein sits down with Mishpacha to shed light on the draft law standoff

Photos: Shlomi Trichter

A day after hundreds of thousands of bnei Torah filled the streets of Yerushalayim in a declaration of determination and faith at the Atzeres Tefillah in Yerushalayim last Thursday afternoon, Rav Yehoshua Eichenstein, Rosh Yeshivas Yad Aharon and a leading address for Yerushalayim’s English-speaking yeshivah community sits down with Mishpacha to shed light on the draft law standoff that has seen yeshivah bochurim arrested and Eretz Yisrael’s flourishing Torah world facing an uncertain future

The rally was triggered by the arrest of yeshivah bochurim who simply want to learn Torah — something no one believed would happen here. The army on the other hand says that it needs more manpower and won’t back down. Do those two things together mean that we’re entering a new era in the relationship between the chareidi community and the State of Israel?

I’ll say in general terms that yes, the reality has changed.  The situation that has existed for decades, meaning almost total army exemptions even for those not learning, won’t continue. What was will not be, for either side. The reality has changed, and it will not return to what it was; not for us, and not for them. But one thing is clear: The Torah world will fight, with every means at its disposal, against any attempt to uproot Torah learning from those in the beis medrash, or to compel others into frameworks that aren’t suitable for sustaining a life of shemiras hamitzvos.

At the same time, it’s possible that the natural course of events will bring certain adjustments in how our community functions within the framework of the state. Yet one foundation is immovable and the gedolei Yisrael are working tirelessly, day and night, to ensure that anyone who wants to learn Torah can do so without disturbance.

Without that, the Jewish People has no existence. It’s unthinkable that Torah learners should live under threat of arrest in a country that calls itself the state of the Jews.

What exactly is the chareidi public fighting for? Why this insistence on confronting the government, the state institutions, and the army?

There are two central principles.

First, without Torah study and Torah scholars who dedicate their lives, day and night, to their sacred calling, the Jewish People has no existence. It’s that simple. Conscripting someone who sits and learns Torah is outside the bounds of discussion, nothing to talk about.

Anyone who truly understands the value of Torah study knows that it cannot be done amid interruption. All the more so when a person must close his Gemara and enlist. It’s impossible. You cannot become a true talmid chacham that way. And the Jewish People must have real talmidei chachamim. This isn’t a bonus; it’s a necessity. We live through open miracles thanks to the Torah that we never stopped learning. Without it, we have no existence.

The second principle is that the entire notion of “equality in bearing the burden” is an illusion, an unfounded, hollow idea. There has never been true equality, and there never will be, certainly not in a democratic society. Just as someone with a gift for mathematics naturally receives a scholarship, the same holds true in every area of life: True equality means that each person fulfills the role and mission for which he was created.

The roles themselves will never be identical, only maximized. When every individual is given the means to fulfill his unique purpose, that is genuine equality. Everything else is baseless fiction, born from what I call the progressive religion, a modern creed that seeks to blur every boundary, to erase every form of identity, all in the name of a false and empty “equality.”

And that, in truth, defines the larger ideological divide we see today. On the right, most of the public still preserves tradition, cherishes its Jewish identity, and retains warm feelings for Torah and mitzvos. The left, however, is driven by another faith entirely, the religion of progressivism, and that one is far more dangerous.

This isn’t a theoretical difference; it plays out daily. It determines with whom we can work toward agreements and understandings and against whom we must fight a full, determined battle, because there are forces in this country whose goal, whether consciously or not, is to uproot everything sacred from within Am Yisrael. And that is something we can never, and will never, allow to happen.

Over the years, we’ve seen cases where men who left full-time learning for work did serve in the army with rabbinic approval. What changed?

Even in the past, the army never provided truly dedicated frameworks that ensured the protection of chareidi soldiers’ spiritual lives. The difference is that years ago, the risks of secularization were much smaller. There were cases where older, married men, already entering the workforce, did military service because it made things easier for them later. The secular environment was also very different back then — it was bearable. Today, the situation is entirely different.

One could argue that the army’s spiritual challenges are technical matters and, in theory, things could change. But at this point, unfortunately, there is no framework that truly guarantees the preservation of a chareidi soldier’s way of life.

If the army were to undergo major reform and become a purely professional force, no longer an ideological or educational institution, and establishes professional tracks that fully preserve the way of life of chareidi recruits — would that change things?

If and when that happens, there will certainly be room for discussion. The gedolei Yisrael will need to examine the issue in depth and determine the proper course of action.

As I’ve said before, going forward things won’t stay the same. The current reality, in which young chareidi men who aren’t learning are nonetheless classified as yeshivah students in every sense, will no longer have a place.

Certainly not when genuine bnei Torah and true talmidei chachamim are harmed by this system — persecuted for their learning by a hostile judicial establishment that searches for any pretext to uproot Torah study, while the wicked point to these others as evidence and justification to tighten their grip and restrict the steps of the Torah public as a whole.

I want to be absolutely clear, though. Even if — and I stress if — the gedolei Yisrael were ultimately to approve some form of arrangement that would allow those young men to enlist, it would require the most stringent spiritual safeguards protected by law. That isn’t currently the case even in the new track offered by the army.

It would require a framework that could guarantee that these boys’ way of life would be protected, with no exposure to any heretical or secularizing educational influence, and the establishment of transparent and legally binding  boundaries. The adapted tracks would have to be entirely detached from the IDF’s “educational” apparatus.

Without that absolute separation, there’s nothing to discuss.

You’ve spoken about two ideologies clashing. How do you see the role of the judiciary in this?

The elected government of Israel doesn’t seek to secularize the chareidim. But it’s not the government that truly rules. The real power lies with the judicial system, the very people who established the state and set out to create a “new nation.” They control the country’s institutional and educational centers. And these are the people who spend day and night thinking how to uproot Torah.

When the left-wing fought against judicial reform, it was because that reform threatened their last remaining bastion, the only thing that preserves their unelected power in the face of demographic reality.

To be part of Israeli civic life is not a problem in itself. We all pay taxes, drive on the roads, use the national healthcare system. That’s reality, and anyone who denies it is simply being foolish. The problem starts when identification becomes political.

In our small country, everything is politics. The moment you publicly declare that you belong to one thing, they attach you to ten others. That’s why the mainstream chareidi community prefers to keep its distance from overt identification, especially today, when the Supreme Court acts as a super-legislator, rendering the democratic process almost meaningless. Those who truly rule Israel are people whose ultimate goal is to uproot Torah.

Did the massive atzeres in Yerushalayim advance the chareidi cause?

We need tefillos. The fact that so many Jews gathered together to pour out their hearts was itself an enormous zechus. We are certain it had tremendous impact in the upper worlds, that Shaarei Shamayim opened.

Whether it accomplished anything politically… that’s hard to say. Perhaps not. But in Shamayim it certainly helped. And that, in the end, is what truly matters.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1085)