Some Torah of Rav Eitam Henkin, Hy"d

In 2015, Rabbi Eitam and Rabbanit Na’ama Henkin Hy”d were murdered by terrorists over Chol Hamoed Sukkot. Rabbi Henkin (the son of Rabbi Yehuda Herzl Henkin and Rabbanit Chana Henkin) was widely acknowledged as an up-and-coming gadol b’Torah who began publishing in recognized rabbinic journals at age 21 and had published forty articles and three books over the next ten years. In 2021, a collection of his writings were translated into English and published as Studies in Halakhah and Rabbinic History. The volume contains 24 chapters including halakhic analyses, explorations of historical revisionism (particularly as relating to Rav Kook), biographical pieces about Rabbi Yosef Eliyahu Henkin, and more.

To review the entire volume would not only take up more space than these emails allow, but would also do a disservice to the memory of Rav Eitam, who I never met but whose personality I am assured comes across on every page. Rather, I will just share a handful of the ideas that I found most informative. The book is available from Koren, as well as Amazon in the US and Canada. May the neshanot of Rav Eitam and Rabbanit Na’ama Henkin have aliyot.

Strawberries

I’ve long referred to strawberries as “my favourite non-kosher fruit” thanks to the position that many in right-wing religious circles have accepted not to eat them. Rav Eitam notes that

In 2008 or thereabouts, a ruling that completely prohibits eating strawberries began to gain popularity. It was based on investigations undertaken by various parties (first in the United States, then in Israel), which concluded that the insects on strawberries - whose presence, as noted, has long been known - remain even after cleansing. This ruling garnered the attention of the kashrut-observant public, and, as a result, much of the community ceased eating strawberries unless they are mashed or peeled.

Rav Eitam noted that “in some respects, the scientific investigations undertaken in modern laboratories have stretched the boundaries of the prohibition beyond the requirements of halakhah” and utilizes the 2009 ruling of his teacher, Rabbi Dov Lior:

Therefore, with respect to strawberries from a source that is not generally known to be infested… one should remove the leafy caps together with a bit of flesh and then rinse the strawberries under running water - and ideally they should be soaked in soapy water and the like for about five minutes - and then they may be eaten. One who is scrupulous should undertake the stringency of running each strawberry in addition to rinsing it; such practice is praiseworthy. On the other hand, one should not object to those who are lenient and eat strawberries after removing the cap and rinsing, even without soaking, for they have much upon which to rely.

This ruling comes from the deep conviction that “it is not the way of the Torah to completely forbid things to the public when a practice has been established and when it is possible to find grounds for leniency.” While “it is surely an act of great piety and asceticism to refrain from eating anything questionable, even after inspection… it is clear that such practice is not the black-letter law and should not be applied to the public.”

Shabbat

Responding to those exercising unusual leniency regarding electronic sensors on Shabbat, Rav Eitam summarized the various levels of prohibition as follows:

1. Any activation that is unintended and we are entirely indifferent to its occurrence - e.g., walking down a street that activates street cameras - is permissible according to most opinions.

2. Any activation that is unintended but the protagonist benefits from the outcome - e.g., streetlights that light up as pedestrians pass by - a few authorities permit but most poskim prohibit (especially if the lighting is beneficial and not just decorative).

3. Any activation that is directly intended with the outcome and its benefits in mind - e.g., walking toward an electronic door or moving one’s hand toward an electronic faucet - is prohibited by all; and the lone opinion permitting this (in the case of a door) requires much further study.

Kiddush

Rav Eitam noted that “Rema writes succinctly regarding the laws of kiddush that it is desirable l’khathilah to follow “the widespread custom” and wash before kiddush.” Indeed, “in our time this halakhah has almost been forgotten, to the extent that those who see it assume that this is a special custom, and they don’t know that such is the ruling of the Rema, in principle and in practice.”

Bruriah (Content Warning: Suicide)

The Talmud in Masechet Avodah Zara references that R. Meir fled to Babylon either due to his entanglement with authorities or due to “the Bruriah Episode.” Rashi there explains that Bruriah mocked the rabbinic adage that “women are light minded” so R. Meir had one of his students attempt to seduce her until it eventually paid off. Upon realizing the truth, Bruriah took her own life and R. Meir fled. Rav Eitam, however, pointed out that

the episode as it appears in Rashi contains a large number of peculiar details that are inconsistent with talmudic sources. Because of this, and due to the complete silence of Tosafot as well as a lack of evidence that the story was known to their generation, there is leeway to conclude that the story was not written by Rashi, but later on, and was inserted into Rashi’s commentary as a result of scribal error.

This leads to the conclusion that “we are no longer forced to accept the story in Rashi as part of Bruriah’s life history, and those who wish to delve into her background now have a concrete basis for ignoring this story.”

Rav Hutner and Rav Kook

Rav Eitam quoted the following from Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Sonnenfeld:

Following Pesah, in Nisan 5625 [1925], when [R. Hutner], as a young man, came to study in the Hevron Yeshiva, he went to visit R. Kook, to whom his family was distantly related. […] In the course of their conversation, R. Kook was called away to an urgent telephone call in the adjacent room. On his way back from the office [i.e., the room with the phone] to his room, R. Kook overheard a conversation between his nephew, R. Raphael Kook, and another person, at the end of which R. Raphael burst into raucous laughter. To R. Kook’s question, “What is the meaning of this laughter"?” R. Raphel replied: “The young man with whom I was speaking just came from the university on Mount Scopus, where he heard a lecture from Prof. Torczyner (Tur-Sinai), head of the Department of Biblical Criticism…”

[…] Upon hearing the foolishness of that “learned” member of the university faculty, R. Kook’s demeanor turned serious, and he returned sadly to his room, sat in his armchair, and sank in thought. “Why are you so saddened?” asked the young guest [R. Hutner]. “My dear young man,” replied R. Kook, “you should know that when Chaim Weizmann came to invite me to the inauguration ceremony for the university, I firmly refused the invitation. And when Weizmann persisted, pleading with me to participate, I told him that, as Chief Rabbi and spiritual leader of the Jewish community in Eretz Yisrael, I could not participate in the dedication of a Hebrew college which would also include a chair for the study of Biblical Criticism. It was only after Weizmann solemnly promised me that the Hebrew University would not have a chair in Biblical Criticism, that I consented to attend the university’s inauguration. And now it turns out that Weismann deceived me…

Rav Hutner himself even offered further clarification of the conversation:

I had arrived in the land for the first time a few days before the opening of the university on Mt. Scopus, and that was when I first became acquainted with our teacher, of saintly memory [Rav Kook]. At the time, he spoke with me at length of all the reasons for his decision to be present at the inauguration, as he moved from one realm of thought to another, as was his holy way, with the flow of his majestic words. One of the main elements of these conversations was the promise that had been made to him, that there would be no place in this university for a chair in Biblical Criticism. Sometime later it happened that I was present in our teacher’s room, when someone entered and reported on the content of Prof. Torczyner [Naftali Hertz Tur-Sinai]’s lecture, which he had delivered at the university the previous evening. Of course, the entire lecture was filled with biblical criticism of the worst sort. Our teacher, of saintly memory, gave me a penetrating glance that conveyed disappointment, bitterness, and pain. To this day I still feel that look in my heart, as though it were a hundred needles stabbing me all at once. I was astounded and shaken by that look, and then, unthinkingly, my lips let out the words: “apparently, apart from the soul, one needs to know the body as well.”

Rav Eitam, however, noted many reasons that the stories as told could not have been accurate. In 1925, Professor Tur-Sinai would still have been at the Hochshule fur die Wissenschaft des Judentums in Berlin. He, in fact, only came to Israel in 1933 and did not begin teaching at Hebrew University until 1934. Furthermore, the lecture in question could not even have been about Biblical Criticism since the university did not have any bible studies until the middle of 1927. Even if one assumes that the story took place in 1934 (when R. Hutner was back in Jerusalem and Prof. tur-Sinai was active at Hebrew University) rather than as recorded in 1925, the story would still need to grapple with the fact that Rav Kook expressed objections against the study of Biblical Criticism there as early as 1926 in private correspondence with Rabbi Joseph Hertz and Aharon Teitelbaum and publicly in 1927. With all of this in mind, Rav Eitam reconstructs the story as follows:

When that young man in 1934 informed R. Kook about Tur-Sinai’s lecture, R. Kook reacted with clear chagrin - the appropriate response to hearing of such nonsense, contrary to the sanctity of the Torah. He subsequently turned to R. Hutner, who was present on that occasion, and again told him the story - which he had already recounted at the press conference in 1927 - regarding the connection between his consent to participate in the university’s inauguration and the promise that he had received at the time regarding the nature of the studies at the university. R. Hutner, who apparently was under the impression that this was the first time that R. Kook had become aware of the university giving a platform to biblical criticism, interpreted R. Kook’s chagrin, from what he heard, as “a penetrating glance that conveyed disappointment, bitterness, and sadness” because of the “discovery” that the promise had been broken. and so blurted out the statement, “apart from the soul, one needs to know the body as well.”

Commenting on the underlying assertion, Rav Eitam wrote that

There were some who were acquainted with R. Kook’s multi-faceted personality primarily as a rabbi who spoke or taught in the beit midrash, who was a posek for those who consulted him, or who delved into the intricacies of the Torah, both revealed and esoteric; however, the complete historical picture of R. Kook’s life and work as Chief Rabbi of Eretz Yisrael… clearly demonstrates that R. Kook definitely knew “there [the secularists’] body stood,” had a close understanding of the situation of all his contemporaries, and worked energetically - and with quite some success - to prevent decline and correct failings in matters related to observance of Torah and mitzvot in the public arena and in Eretz Yisrael.

Parting of the Ways

Outlining about how Rav Kook’s followers became divided, Rav Eitam wrote that

By the 1940s, the ideological differences between the camps [Hareidi and Religious Zionist] became more externally visible. It became increasingly untenable for someone to identify socially and culturally with one camp while, at the same time, identifying with the philosophy of someone seen as the founder of the other camp. When faced with a start choice between a pro-Zionist ideology, or at least a measured approach to the nationalist stirrings within the Jewish people in the spirit of R. Kook on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the conservation of the old-world traditional way of life that was being preserved only in the haredi community, many of R. Kook’s fervent supporters chose the latter approach. Only a few chose to cling to the Zionist ideology while still functioning within the “Lithuanian” haredi community; or the reverse: to operate within the religious-Zionist community while maintaining a haredi lifestyle. this complex choice generally did not succeed in holding its ground through two or three generations [ a few such rabbinic families included the Auerbachs, Elyashivs, Waldenbergs, and more] For this reason, many of the personalities close to R. Kook in his lifetime… sent most of their sons to learn in Yeshivat Ponevezh in Bnei Brak or in Yeshivat Hevron in Jerusalem, and not in Merkas HaRav or other religious-Zionist yeshivot such as Yeshivat Kerem B’Yavneh.

This is the key to understanding the phenomenon that we have presented, of individuals whose current identification with the haredi camp prevents them from coming to terms with the fact that their fathers and grandfathers, in their day, were counted as part of the circle of supporters and associates of R. Kook. This is also the key to understanding a long string of historical phenomena on the seam between the haredi and religious-Zionist camps. It explains the decline of Merkaz HaRav during the era of R. Yaakov Moshe Harlap’s leadership. It explains the creation of middle-of-road political options, such as Poalei Agudath Israel, and their subsequent collapse. And it can also explain the edifying case of Germany’s Orthodox Jews. Upon the aliyah of many during the 1930s, they split almost evenly into the religious and haredi camps, sometimes even within families. To use stereotypical terms, when these Jews, who grew up with the ideology of “Torah and Derekh Eretz,” landed in Eretz Yisrael in the 30s and 40sm they were forced to choose between a camp that claimed sole ownership of “Torah” and a camp that claimed sole possession of “Derekh Eretz.” A decade earlier, in the days of R. Kook, this dichotomy did not yet gain traction, certainly not in R. Kook himself. Yet later on, he would become identified with only one political, social, and cultural camp.

Concluding Thoughts

What united all of the shared ideas (and all 24 chapters in the book) is Rav Eitam’s willingness to find the historical truth while staying firmly in conversation with Torah. The same basic methodology is utilized in both his halakhic and historic analyses. As R. Dr. Eliezer Bodt wrote in the book’s introduction, Rav Eitam “was a seeker of truth, who carefully evaluated the evidence he gathered, devoid of any intent to seek out scandal.” Indeed, in Rav Eitam’s own words from his essay on the heter mekhirah,

“one must clarify the facts honestly to the fullest possible extent, and be careful not to misrepresent them one way or the other, consciously, or otherwise, in order to buttress the desired outcome… the real world tends by nature to be nuanced, for which reason the tendency to describe historical data as if they all, from beginning to end, support a specific contemporary position is a far cry from the pursuit of truth.”

Everyone can learn something about the pursuit of truth by learning these Studies. Each is a breath of fresh air that highlights the tremendous loss that Klal Yisrael faced when Rav Eitam and Rabbanit Na’ama were taken from us so far before their time. May their memories be for a blessing and their Torah continue to flourish.