rabbiofberlin – sorry, but even before I clicked “Send Post” I already anticipated your question and decide I’m not going to go there. Sorry to disappoint. You’ll have to figure it out yourself.
🙂
As far as your, “the apparent infallibility of Rabbonim for one”, that is a machlokes Rishonim. I’m sure, your being a “Rabbi”, you know that already.
😉
BTW – my intention was not to downcast religious Zionists as you apparently assumed, but rather to state that if not for their attaching their belief system to a Secular State, Religious Zionism could have had legitimacy liken to many of the early religious Zionists. Perhaps even I would have conformed to the idealism if that were the case. If you notice, the Gedolim I quoted above were down casting Herzl’s Zionism as Anti-Torah and treif. I don’t know what they would have said about Rav Kook’s vision of Zionism.
One thing to keep in mind is that even Rav Kook’s greatest opponents (such as Rav Chaim Yosef Zonenfeld, z”l) had tremendous admiration for him. They just differed with him on how to handle the situation of the time. They felt we needed to distant ourselves from the Secular Zionists and he felt we need to embrace them and in time they would turn back to Torah Judaism and Moshiach will then come. He also felt Yishuv E”Y would bring Moshiach. Others argued. This is a Machlokes Gedolim. Arguing who’s right is liken to deciding which Tanna or Amorah is right. That’s not for us to decide. Rather, our job is to decide which Gadol we want to follow. You Rav Kook, others other Gedolim.
As far as modern day religious zionism? Unfortunately, in my opinion, Religious Zionism of today is not the Religious Zionism that Rav Kook envisioned.