This story could have started 80 years ago, 19 years ago, or on Monday this week.
On the 24th of Chashvan 1935, 80 years ago this week, Baron Edmond James de Rothschild passed away peacefully. The deceased's last name still means one thing: money. And a lot of it. "If I Were a Rothschild" is not only a famous song from the musical 'Fiddler on the Roof' but a Hebrew idiom that has survived from the days of Anu-Banu to the Milki protest.
Anyone who listened a little to a history teacher or a guide on a class trip to Zichron Yaakov can tell you that this Rothschild was not just rich, but also one of the fathers of the Hebrew settlement in the Land of Israel. This French Jew, also known as "the famous benefactor" (because he initially wished to remain anonymous), bought over half a million dunams (!) of land in the Land of Israel, supported the first colonies, and established settlements and factories for the most part. That's more or less what I knew about him until recently.
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And now from "the father of the settlement" to "the father of the knitted kippahs." 19 years ago, Rabbi Moshe Zvi Neriah passed away. He left behind a magnificent legacy, and also one small request, which was made by Rabbi Israel Glis, a man of Jerusalem. Glis, a colorful journalist and famous storyteller, makes sure to fulfill the same request of Rabbi Neria every year, and this already leads us to Monday this week, the 24th of Cheshvan, 5775.
At 12 noon, Glis, along with about forty students from the Bnei Akiva Sde Yaakov Yeshiva, entered the cool tomb cave, in the heart of the pastoral Ramat Hanadiv Garden next to Zichron Yaakov. There, next to the tombstone of the Baron and his wife, Baroness Ada, he told the high school students: "What are we doing here? Why is it important that this man passed away exactly 80 years ago today? Why did I come here from Jerusalem and why did I bring you here? I am not from the Bnei Akiva yeshiva, and I don't look like one either. I grew up in Mea Shearim and I am from the Haredi community, but I was privileged to know Rabbi Neriah. Since the Six Day War, I have been going to pray Shacharit at the Western Wall, and have been doing so, thank God, for 47 years now. Over the years, I became friends with Rabbi Neriah, who would come to the Wall from time to time, stand on the steps and pray the Vetikin prayer. I think he prayed there because from there you can see the sunrise. He stood up and from there he heard the sounds of the Chazat Shatz from the Wall. Whenever I saw him coming to pray, I stood behind him to hear his prayer, which was sweet. He would talk to God, literally a conversation with the Creator of the world. It was a pleasure to hear.
""Once I saw him descend the stairs towards the Western Wall itself and join one of the minyanim, and say Kaddish at the end of the prayer. I asked him why and for whom he was saying Kaddish, and he took me aside and said: 'Today is the 24th of Cheshvan. It is the Yahrzeit of Baron Rothschild. Since his passing, I have been observing the Yahrzeit day and saying Kaddish over him and lighting a soul candle.' I remember Rabbi Neriah holding my hand tightly and telling me: 'After I turn 120, you will continue with this.' And indeed, since Rabbi Neriah passed away, 19 years ago, I have been observing this instruction - saying Kaddish over Rothschild and lighting a soul candle. This year, on the eightieth anniversary of the Baron's passing, I thought I would upgrade it and come with a minyan to his grave. It is fitting for a person who did so much that we should say a big thank you to him. Acknowledgement is one of the most important things in Judaism. And you, you are part of it today. "So let's say Kaddish together here for the repose of the soul of Baron Rothschild, Rabbi Avraham Binyamin ben Yaakov.".
But why did Rabbi Neriah see the need to take such care of Rothschild's soul in the afterlife? What is the meaning of this connection? I got the answer a few months ago, when I visited the Ramat Hanadiv Garden myself. My wife's family chose to celebrate her grandmother's birthday there, and while most visitors marvel at the rare varieties of truly spectacular vegetation, I was drawn to Rothschild's life story, which was revealed to me for the first time. From a sentence and a half spoken in the film "Beyond the Gardens" that is shown to visitors there, I understood that he had a warm connection to tradition, and from there I began to delve deeper into his biography. It turns out that he was much more than a philanthropist. He was crazy about the Land of Israel, but no less so – about the Torah of Israel. He shared the first craze with the pioneers, and he tried to pass on the second craze to them, even though some of them were, as we know, infuriatingly secular. He and his wife observed the laws of kashrut and Shabbat (and, of course, charity) and took a close-knit butcher with them on their travels in Israel and around the world. Rothschild used to go to the synagogue on Sabbaths and holidays, where he met the Chief Rabbi of Paris, Rabbi Tzadok HaCohen, and became close to him. Thus, while he was purchasing land and encouraging settlers to establish more and more settlements, he also called on them not to break away from Judaism.
In an argument he had with one of his officials, who wanted to downplay the teaching of Judaism in the schools of the colonies, the Baron told him: "You, sir, are a national Jew, but I am a Jewish Jew." During his visits to the land, he excitedly visited both the newly renovated settlements and holy places such as Rachel's Tomb and the Western Wall (when he visited the Wall, by the way, a rumor spread in Jerusalem that he had come to buy it). During his visit to Zichron Yaakov, everyone gathered for a festive Mincha prayer in the synagogue, and then he demanded that they be careful to observe the Torah and warned: "In the past, when the children of Israel did not listen to the voice of their prophets, the Lord expelled them from His land. And you, beware lest you abandon the ways of our Torah. Show all the people of the world that a Jew who walks the path of pure faith and whose Torah is pure is also a diligent worker and is beneficial to the land and humanity in general.".
He demanded that the farmers employ only Jewish workers and explained to the settlers at the time – in Petah Tikva, Metula, Rishon LeZion and more – that he was not financing them for financial reasons at all: "It was not because of your poverty that I supported you and took you under my protection, but rather because of your great desire to live and work in the Holy Land and to live according to the spirit of our Torah.".
In one of the settlements, a festive reception was held in his honor, and one of the students was asked by him to recite the Shema by heart. When she did not know, Rothschild ordered the teacher to be fired. During his stubborn struggle for the Balfour Declaration, when he met a delegation of farmers, he told them: "I am sorry that religious feeling is deficient among you. Among the Jews, religious feeling is the main thing. It is the basis of the nation. Only religious feeling can unite all parts of the people.".
So why is it surprising that Rabbi Neriah said Kaddish over him? It turns out that it wasn't just Rabbi Neriah's rabbi, Rabbi Kook, who went on the "colony tour." In fact, every visit by Rothschild to one of the thirty settlements he financed was a mini-colony tour of sorts. Everyone took the money from him, the messages - a little less so. In many of these settlements, the grandchildren of those very pioneers don't exactly know the Shema by heart today.
On Rothschild's last visit to Israel, he also visited young Tel Aviv. The entire city came out to cheer on the revered benefactor, and in the Great Synagogue, Mayor Meir Dizengoff, poets Chaim Nachman Bialik and Shaul Tchernichovsky, and the heads of the Yishuv Nachum Sokolov, Pinchas Rotenberg, and Arthur Ruppin were waiting for him. The Baron, who was elderly and had come to Israel against the advice of his doctors, spent a long time preparing the speech he delivered there to the large audience, a speech that was considered a kind of testament to him. This speech is still framed in a gold frame in the synagogue hall. This week, when I read this poignant speech, which is so simple and so powerful, I told myself that I would try to remember to light a candle for his repose on the 24th of next Chashvan. When we discuss the opening of fireworks in Tel Aviv on Shabbat or the budget law, it is fascinating to hear what one of the greatest philanthropists of all time in the Zionist enterprise has to say about all this. He actually reminds us of what is most important, what true LIBA studies are and what we are even looking for here.
""To the Rock of Israel I will lift my heart and thank Him with all my soul, for His grace has inclined me and granted me the privilege of witnessing this wonderful sight in my old age, the vision of the revival of Israel. We are blessed to live in this blessed time. In all places new settlements have been revived, and we can say that the national home stands on two strong foundations, which are the work of the land and industry. But the true sign of the national home is not the spiritual and moral work, in which the spirit of Judaism can develop. It is impossible for the people of Israel to exist in its land without connection with our great past and our tradition, but only by material forces. What can a small group of Jews do in this corner? Even against a small storm you will have no revival, and you will be like a blown straw and a blooming cloud. In everything you turn, you must follow the ideas of Judaism, according to their clear signs, and after the moral perfection that is the very essence of our religion. The eternal teaching of the highest spirituality. This is the Torah that the people of Israel received thousands of years ago, at a time when all the nations Those around him were still savages and immersed in their abominations. It was she who sustained the Jewish people, who lived forever. These tablets of the covenant, which Moses received on Mount Sinai, remain to this day the foundation of all culture. Then the prophets came and proclaimed with their lips the great principles of Torah and morality, of purity and holiness.".
And Rothschild concluded his last speech thus: "Our fathers have handed down to their sons from generation to generation, like a beacon of light that will never be extinguished, the divine idea. If you continue this tradition, you too will be able to fulfill a great role in the world, the role befitting the descendants of the fathers, the seed that hears the voice of prophets. According to your deeds – the nations will honor you. Please educate your sons in the Torah that our fathers handed down to us, and which has sustained our people and brought them to this day. Be faithful to your past. The candle that our fathers gave us will not go out, it will be passed on from generation to generation. The place will protect the national home in the Land of Israel.".
If only we were Rothschilds.
