Tammuz 3 “Why has the Land gone to Ruin?” – God’s Answer

Source Sheet – Why was the land lost

“Who is a man so wise that he could ascertain this? Who is there to whom the mouth of God has spoken that he could answer this? Why has the land gone to ruin and become like a desert, empty of men?”

The question was put before the sages and they didn’t know how to answer it. It was put before the prophets and they didn’t know how to answer it. God Himself answered it:

“Then God said: Because they abandoned My Torah, which I had placed before them, and because of that did not listen to My Voice and did not walk in it (the ways of the Torah).”

Asks the Gemara, aren’t the two ideas the same (not listening to God’s voice and not walking in the ways of the Torah)? The Gemara answers in the name of Rav Yehuda in the name of Rav: The meaning behind the verse is that שלא ברכו בתורה תחילה – they did not first say the Bracha over the Torah.

(Yirmiyahu 9, Nedarim 81)

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When the sages asked why the land went to ruin, they were not implying that logically the land should have been safe and secure. They understood well that the armies of the Babylonians and later the Romans were larger and stronger than those of Israel. They understood that Israel’s location, being at the crossroads of the East and the West, made it extremely vulnerable to being conquered. Rather, they understood that Israel had survived for a thousand years on its land, miraculously. They were asking what was the reason God no longer sustained them on their land with His Divine Providence. The moment God removed His powerful protection, they would lose the land by natural means.

Again and again Israel repeated the same pattern of  –  שמנת עבית כשית – You grew fat and gross and course (Deut. 35:15). For the majority of its time on the Land, every time the nation experienced blessing it allowed that blessing to overtake their better senses and become a cause of separation from God. Over and over God sent the people warnings and suffering to educate them to correct this mistake. Each time they repented but then repeated the same mistake. The sages were asking: Why didn’t Israel emerge from its centuries-long school of suffering strengthened adequately to withstand the test of good fortune?

God’s answer was: Because they abandoned My Torah which I placed before them.

Rabbenu Yona explains: The verse can’t be understood literally, that they weren’t learning Torah. If that were the case, the sages and prophets would have known this. The answer would have been obvious. Rather, they did learn Torah but שלא ברכו בתורה תחילה – they did not first say the Bracha over the Torah.

RSRH offers two explanations of שלא ברכו בתורה תחילה:

1. In a novel understanding of the phrase שלא ברכו בתורה תחילה, he translates it as: They didn’t consider the Torah as the blessing from which all other blessings come. They didn’t consider the Torah to be the first of their blessings and the source of all blessings. The Torah was to them just one of their possessions. It wasn’t their primary task. It was viewed as just one of their various occupations. The Torah didn’t take precedence in their minds over their other possessions and so they did not praise God, for the Torah, above all else. God had “put the Torah before them” – meaning, at every turn of life the Torah was intended to be their guide and measuring stick. All of life was to be directed by the eyes of the Torah. They failed to allow this to happen.

The path to becoming distant from God is as follows: First, for various reasons, one isn’t filled with complete love and appreciation of the Torah. One begins to study other knowledge and acquire possessions. Next, instead of viewing this knowledge and wealth as tools to serve God, they become goals to strive for, separate from and independent of a relationship with God. Once that happens we will no longer measure the extent that we pursue these areas of our lives by the measurement of what God asks of us in His Torah. Our hearts become divided. We no longer belong to God with an undivided heart and soul. We have dual sets of priorities. That is the first generation…

What does the education such parents give their children look like? They will be taught שלא לברך בתורה תחילה. Not to place the Torah as the guiding point of life. The parents will be satisfied with a minimum Jewish education and be happy if their children can read Hebrew and have a superficial knowledge of some Torah ideas. The parents will worry if the child is taking his religious duties too seriously, taking a more religious outlook on life. What is the likely outcome of such an education? The entire path to apostasy has been prepared…

2. The classic understanding of the phrase שלא ברכו בתורה תחילה is that they did not say a Bracha before learning Torah. RSRH develops this according to his understanding of the concept of blessing and his overall approach to learning Torah as follows:

They approached Torah as they would any other subject. The commitment to fulfill what we study before we study was lacking. We should fist step toward God before we open the book of His Teaching. When we set out to study, we should wish to bless Him. Blessing God means to seek to carry out His will. (To further appreciate the concept of blessing God see RSRH in Horeb, at the beginning of the section called Avodah. Also, listen to my shiur called An Approach to Tefillah in the audio section.) 

When we learn Torah with the intent to listen to the commandments and carry them out, we learn לשמה. This is the way Torah was intended to be learned which is ללמוד וללמד לשמור ולעשות – to learn in order to teach and fulfill. When we do so, the Torah we learn becomes a knowledge of the Divine Will.

The approach to learning begins with the question: “How must we shape our life?” and the answer we have is “So that it might please our Father in Heaven.” When this spirit of duty – this Bracha concept, leads to the Torah, then the Torah will again lead to acceptance of duty. Then the Torah will bring us closer to our great Goal. There is no value inherent in the learning of Torah if it is not done for the purpose of bring us nearer to the Goal. גדול תלמוד שמביא לידי מעשה

Collected Writings Volume 1
pages 297-307