Stick to your prayers

Last weekend I picked up a book on the life of the founder of Modern Hebrew, Eliezer ben Yehuda (1858-1922). Already the first page captured me and since that moment I have been reading every spare moment I had. The book is written in the way of a novel which makes it very readable and makes you almost re-live the events described. Ill write a review in another post when I finish but for now I wanted to share what I thought was a very nice anecdote.

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Eliezer ben Yehuda’s mission was to revive the Hebrew language and one of the principal ways he chose was his weekly newspaper ‘HaTzvi’, of course in Hebrew. The religious men who were mainly present in Jerusalem were opposed to his idea(s) because they felt that Hebrew was a holy language, not to be used in common conversations. In addition to that he was quite a freethinker making him even more a perceived threat to the traditionalists.

During his time Palestine was under the governance of the Ottoman Empire and they werent very pleased with the inflow of Jews to Palestine so they issued several decrees to frustrate this (immigrant quota’s, prohibition to build houses, etc.) Eliezer ben Yehuda tried to avoid trouble with the rulers and so was careful with what he wrote. One day however his father-in-law wrote a supplement for Channukah which contained a phrase that could be interpreted as calling men to assemble for war but was really meant more in the spirit of a dedication to the building of their society. At any rate, the religious immediately took advantage of it and went to the rulers explaining that Eliezer ben Yehuda had nationalist motives and wanted to assemble men for war against the Ottoman dominance.

The Rabbi’s issued a formal ban (cherem) on Eliezer ben Yehuda and he was put into prison by the rulers. Eliezer’s case was tried but the judges were pre-disposed to the traditionalists and so he was charged guilty. He appealed and it took quite some time before the case would be heard. In the mean time both Eliezer ben Yehuda as well as the Rabbi’s realized that there was one man that was higher than the court (in practice) and that ultimately his opinion would prevail. The wealthy Baron Rothschild, who financed activities of both parties. Up to that point he did not state which side he favoured and so both parties were anxiously awaiting his judgement.

One day the Rabbi’s received a short telegram from Paris saying:

Carry out your prayers. Baron Rothschild

Realizing that he had chosen the side of Eliezer ben Yehuda, the Rabbi’s immediately lifted the ban. Because not doing so would mean cutting off one of their primary sources of income. The Rabbi’s dropped their accusation and Eliezer ben Yehuda was in a later stage acquitted by the court.

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I found the response of the Baron to be very apt, and think it remains relevant in many cases. When religious leadership starts to bother itself with politics you often get very bad results. There are of course times when the religious leadership needs to take a strong stance but history is a good record of showing how religious leadership generally takes the wrong stance which not only amplifies the problems but also reflects bad on religion itself.

Any thoughts on the idea of religious leadership to “stick to their prayers” instead of involving themselves in politics?