Emuna

Thank God, the concept of "Kiruv", bringing others close to Torah is clearly on the agenda & being discussed more and more, whether in the context of NCSY, Lubavitch, Bnei Akiva etc. Rav Kook shows here how to motivate people of this essential idea.

The centrality of the Land and State of Israel in Judaism is well known, and surely in the writings of Rav Kook. That just sharpens the question of why God sent us to exile? Even though galut is presented in the Tanach just as a deterrent, or a threat of punishment that isn't meant to be carried out, nevertheless, there must be some positive aspect of galut itself! Only after understanding the goal of galut, can we then understand when exile has "played out" its role and it's time to come home to Israel, to revive Eretz Yisrael and Medinat Yisrael, to return to the original Judaism.

When Alex Shafir was called to do a random act of kindness he discovers he was repaying a debt 30 years later!

Very often even the most motivated & religious feel a lack of enthusiasm to learn Torah or wake up for shul. Similarly, Post-Modernism poses a great challenge for religion. A culture which is based on democracy & freedom, is skeptical about truth, is over-run with "Fake-News", and stresses myself and my "self-awareness" seems like an inevitable threat to Judaism. Rav Kook was a century ahead of his time, and directs us practically how Post-Modernism is meant to be used to our advantage, and help us rise to a new level of spirituality where we do mitzvot out of identification rather than peer pressure. This is the solution to strengthen our motivation whenever it weakens! Also, if looking for "My" Torah, when can one disagree with his rabbi? A Super-Important lesson & Game-Changer in education!

The importance of Torah scholarship is clearly central to Jews- the "People of the Book", but Rav Kook feels it necessary to reveal the other side of the coin. God gave us the "Living Torah" relevant even to the masses even living primitively in nature. God explicitly wants a Nation of Israel, not just knowledgeable & religious individuals, not just rabbis & professors who can sometimes "outsmart" themselves, but also the common people. The intelligentsia needs the masses who are more healthy & natural in spirit, action & belief, just as the masses need the intelligentsia to lead & analyze the more complicated issues. In an era without prophets or Sanhedrin, only God's ignorant masses can sometimes solve historic & halachic difficulties.

The main mitzvah upon which all the other mitzvot are structured is emuna, certainty of G-d. The Gemara tells us (Makkot 24) that the Prophet Habakuk "summed up" all the mitzvot into one, saying, "The righteous will live by his faith." Therefore, since we are obligated to teach our children to fulfill the Torah's commandments, it is clear that we must teach them emuna from a very young age – for that is the mitzvah on which everything else stands.