Reply To: What's wrong with the draft?

Many thanks for your answers. My responses:

avhaben said: ”Because anyone who wants to learn Torah full-time is entitled to do so even if he is a poor learner. All that is to be expected of him is to DESIRE to learn Torah.”

My response: That is exactly my point. I never suggested that learners of low ability/intelligence should stop. I was referring instead to those Bochurim who are ‘in learning’ purely because that is the system, to get a good shidduch; those Kollel Yungerleit who find sitting in Kollel drinking coffee while Shver picks up the tab easier than earning a job — not because they actually have [as you put it] the ‘DESIRE’ to learn Torah. I don’t think their absence from the Beis hamedrash would be that sorely felt, nor do I imagine their presence actually is Meigen Eretz Yisrael more than physical hishtadlus of picking up a gun.

By the way, Yaakov Avinu did not think his Torah was enough when facing Esov, so why do you think it is?

popa_bar_abba said: ”If you weren’t asking lekanter, you wouldn’t insert hyperbole such as: “Why is the Yeshiva velt so opposed to giving anything back to the State of Israel?” ”

I think you owe me an apology – I meant it sincerely.

write or wrong said: ”The world exists in the merit of Limud Torah. If the Israeli gov’t pulls everyone out of yeshiva, in what merit will Israel be protected?”

The Israeli govt is not suggesting to pull ‘everyone’ out of yeshiva – the Iluyim will remain, as I wrote above. (As an aside – isn’t that the way it’s always been throughout history – the top guys went to Yeshiva and the others were ‘just’ [sarcasm/irony] Baalei Batim? Why has the expectation changed?)

akuperma – thank you for your articulate responses, the latter 2 which I agree with and appreciate.

simcha613 – excellent post, well said.