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| A 1835 letter written by R. Hillel Rivlin from the Holy Land to his family back in Shklov |
In the previous post, we examined the work by Dr Arie Morgenstern entitled ‘Hastening the Redemption,’[1] which supports the notion that various waves of Aliya during the early nineteenth century were undertaken by students of the Vilna Gaon and on his command. Hundreds of families left Europe to settle in the Holy Land in what was believed to be the beginning stages of the final Redemption, and they were inspired by the Kabbalistic and messianic Zionism of the Vilna Gaon. This Redemption was to be a pragmatic and practical process of rebuilding and settlement of the Land that would involve human effort and not rely on supernatural intervention.
This notion, however, has been severely challenged by Professor Immanuel Etkes in his work entitled ‘The Invention of a Tradition.’[2] Morgenstern’s work is convincingly and meticulously researched based on recently discovered communications by the leaders of the Mitnagdic Aliya, such as R. Menachem Mendel of Shklov and R. Yisrael of Shklov − and so is Etkes’ work based on historical facts and convincing argumentation. Etkes is backed by scholars like Yoseph Avivi, David Assaf, Israel Yuval, Benjamin Brown, Ada Rapoport-Albert, David Assaf, David Biale and Allan Nadler (a student of Isadore Twersky).
This means that we are confronted by a fascinating and important head-to-head historical, political and theological deliberation, on a topic of major significance, let alone interest.
