Who is really a Gibbor? Who is really a Kadosh?

The following exchange was posted several days ago in the coffee room. It began when Shimon Katz (who I often agree with) butted into a debate between ZSK (who I respect although we often disagree) and SomeJew (who we all know and love…) [To be fair, I also butted into the same debate, and called out the כפירה שבו, but more בקיצור.] ZSK correctly pointed out (in a subsequent post) that Shimon was going off topic. Therefore, I chose to copy the relevant piece to a new thread, because of the very critical issues it touched on, that many ostensibly Chareidi Jews seem to be confused about.

So here it is: [In two places in Shimon’s rebuttal, I added information in square parentheses.]

ZSK: As for “sending their children off to die in wars… just like the non-Jewish nations”. For 2,000 years, Jewish children were slaughtered like sheep because they didn’t have an army. To imply that there is no difference between a Jew dying as a helpless victim of a Cossack and a Jew dying as a soldier defending EY is an insult to the Kedoshim. עד כאן ZSK.

Shimon K: There are multiple problems with this string of non-sequiturs (including כפירה). Let’s focus for now on the circular reasoning. Why is a “Jew dying as a soldier defending EY” (actually, defending the secular country of Israel) fundamentally any different than “the non-Jewish nations sending their children off to die in wars” defending THEIR nations? Why is there any religious significance or any other ערך מוסף specifically when one dies in defense of Israel. Don’t tell me stories about “protecting Jews”. There are plenty of Jews protected by the US Army (including those in Israel…) Your warped redefinition of קדוש is limited to defense of a very specific political entity that RZ have imbued with Messianic levels of קדושה, even though its founders and leaders don’t even believe in קדושה altogether, (although that never stopped them from making emotional references to קדושים when it suited their purposes.) Why is that not an insult to the REAL קדושים who died to remain faithful to Hashem and His Torah? Remember that up until the Holocaust, almost without exception, there was always an ‘escape clause’ of adopting the non-Jewish religion, something countless Jews were PROUD to be “slaughtered like sheep” NOT to do. Those are our REAL Kedoshim and Giborim הכובש את יצרו, who we make a מי שברך for (right before you proudly make the מי שברך for the State envisioned by [Herzl] the ימח שמו וזכרו who, as per his own diary, wanted to bring כלל ישראל to convert to Catholicism, before he switched to nationalism, and later his children became משומדים without being forced.) A Jew (or Druze or Arab volunteer) who dies for Israel (only two-thirds of which is even located inside about half of “EY”) is not religiously different than an American soldier who dies for America (which is home to more Jews…)

אלא מאי, your problem isn’t with the spilling of Jewish blood. Your problem is with “helplessness”. With “like sheep to the slaughter” Something we proudly say in Davening as a זכות for us – ובכל זאת שמך לא שכחנו. The Zionists did the “best” job of להשכיחם שמך ever. But they didn’t like the sheep stuff… So they made up a new ethos of “no more sheep” and also no more ״שמך לא שכחנו״ Chas Veshalom. Why do you, and so many more RZ like you, who Daven every day, and say these words every Monday and Thursday, buy into a bogus ideology that says the exact opposite? Sounds a lot like the title of this thread [The Dissonance of Redemption], doesn’t it?

We are sheep for the slaughter and proud of it, as long as ובכל זאת שמך לא שכחנו. And if ח״ו someone DOES forget Hashem ר״ל, no amount of muscle and bravery makes him worthy of any sort of honor. Don’t even start building straw man arguments about “what if he dies protecting Jews”. Without Hashem, someone like that could easily kill Jews or send Jews to die in order to further the cause he believes in and is ready to die for. You know well that such things have actually happened. עד כאן Shimon Katz.

מכאן ואילך YYA:

As Shimon pointed out, there are two problems here. Number one is blaming Jewish suffering and death on “not having an army”. Before we even begin to discuss the actual Halacha and Hashkafa of what the Neviim and Chachamim have to say about this, let’s review a little history. At the time of the חורבן בית המקדש, both the First and the Second, there was a Jewish army. At the time of Churban Beitar – Bar Kochva there was a formidable army that even the Romans were freaked out by. That didn’t stop more than a million Jewish deaths in each of those episodes. More than were killed at any one time during the subsequent 1800 years that we didn’t have an army, except during the Holocaust. Not because they didn’t have muscles or weapons. Because the Ribbono Shel Olam decided not to let them win.

But we need not go there. There are literally hundreds of places in Tanach and Chazal, in the Siddur and in the Chumash, in Krias Shema and written on our Tefillin and Mezuzos, that teach us that Jewish suffering and bloodshed is NOT because of political or military factors, but because of aveiros. ומפני חטאינו גלינו מארצינו. Period. End of discussion. Or so it should be. As it happened, ZSK took great offense at this accusation of כפירה, and said:

(I haven’t violated any of the 13 principles, whether short or long version, or anything in any of Rambam’s writings)

OK. Let us assume לצורך העניין that we ONLY pasken like the Rambam. So be it. What about this:

הלכות תענית פרק א הלכה ג

מִצְוַת עֲשֵׂה מִן הַתּוֹרָה לִזְעֹק וּלְהָרִיעַ בַּחֲצוֹצְרוֹת עַל כָּל צָרָה שֶׁתָּבוֹא עַל הַצִּבּוּר. שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר (במדבר י ט) “עַל הַצַּר הַצֹּרֵר אֶתְכֶם וַהֲרֵעֹתֶם בַּחֲצֹצְרוֹת”. כְּלוֹמַר כָּל דָּבָר שֶׁיָּצֵר לָכֶם כְּגוֹן בַּצֹּרֶת וְדֶבֶר וְאַרְבֶּה וְכַיּוֹצֵא בָּהֶן זַעֲקוּ עֲלֵיהֶן וְהָרִיעוּ:
וְדָבָר זֶה מִדַּרְכֵי הַתְּשׁוּבָה הוּא. שֶׁבִּזְמַן שֶׁתָּבוֹא צָרָה וְיִזְעֲקוּ עָלֶיהָ וְיָרִיעוּ יֵדְעוּ הַכּל שֶׁבִּגְלַל מַעֲשֵׂיהֶם הָרָעִים הוּרַע לָהֶן כַּכָּתוּב (ירמיה ה כה) “עֲוֹנוֹתֵיכֶם הִטּוּ” וְגוֹ’. וְזֶה הוּא שֶׁיִּגְרֹם לָהֶם לְהָסִיר הַצָּרָה מֵעֲלֵיהֶם:
אֲבָל אִם לֹא יִזְעֲקוּ וְלֹא יָרִיעוּ אֶלָּא יֹאמְרוּ דָּבָר זֶה מִמִּנְהַג הָעוֹלָם אֵרַע לָנוּ וְצָרָה זוֹ נִקְרָה נִקְרֵית. הֲרֵי זוֹ דֶּרֶךְ אַכְזָרִיּוּת וְגוֹרֶמֶת לָהֶם לְהִדַּבֵּק בְּמַעֲשֵׂיהֶם הָרָעִים. וְתוֹסִיף הַצָּרָה צָרוֹת אֲחֵרוֹת. הוּא שֶׁכָּתוּב בַּתּוֹרָה (ויקרא כו כז) “וַהֲלַכְתֶּם עִמִּי בְּקֶרִי” (ויקרא כו כח) “וְהָלַכְתִּי גַּם אֲנִי עִמָּכֶם בַּחֲמַת קֶרִי”. כְּלוֹמַר כְּשֶׁאָבִיא עֲלֵיכֶם צָרָה כְּדֵי שֶׁתָּשׁוּבוּ אִם תֹּאמְרוּ שֶׁהִיא קֶרִי אוֹסִיף לָכֶם חֲמַת אוֹתוֹ קֶרִי:

Note that the pashut p’shat in the פסוק that the Rambam brings is referring to actual WAR ובבא מלחמה בארצכם על הצר וגו׳, the other things are learned through היקש. Note also that the Rambam is referring EVEN to a time when we had a real Halachic Jewish army and were allowed to and required to engage in combat. But if someone blames the war on political or military חשבונות, not on בגלל מעשיהם הרעים, then he is accused of cruelty and callousness and brings upon Klal Yisroel more problem ר״ל. The Rambam further says explicitly that if we attribute our problems to our aveiros הוא שיגרום להם להסיר הצרה מעליהם. If someone doesn’t BELIEVE in this (as opposed to someone who does believe, but does what he wants because of weakness), then he violates the sixth (belief in the words of Nevim, as in כי אם עוונותיכם i.e. ONLY עוונותיכם), seventh (belief in Toras Moshe in ALL OF ITS DETAILS), and eighth (the fidelity of the Mesorah that teaches us how to understand the Pesukim) Ikkarim like anyone who doesn’t accept EVEN ONE DETAIL of ANYTHING in the Torah (if he does it as a matter of principle and lack of belief, i.e. in this case because he subscribes to a different Torah called Zionism.)

I challenge anyone to come up with ANY source in כל התורה כולה that Jewish suffering and death is because we didn’t have an army. Hegel, Nietzsche and Jabotinsky are not acceptable sources…

Next sentence next problem:

ZSK: “To imply that there is no difference between a Jew dying as a helpless victim of a Cossack and a Jew dying as a soldier defending EY is an insult to the Kedoshim” עד כאן ZSK.

Please read Shimon Katz’s rebuttal of this, which is really just a tiny sampler of Chazal, and then please explain, from a purely Jewish standpoint, why there is anything honorable about ‘going down fighting’. Especially for a secular cause, as opposed to the “helpless sheep” who CHOSE to give their lives rather than accept a foreign religion.

Then, aside from Shimon’s questions, please address the following additional questions:

1. Is a Druze or Arab who “died as a soldier defending EY” also a קדוש? If not, why not? What about soldiers from Trump’s “Peace Force”? Does he need to be in IDF uniform like [להבדיל!] a Kohen needs to wear Bigdei Kehuna for the קדושה to be חל?

2. Correct me if I’m wrong, but ZSK seems to conflate “defending EY”, “defending the secular State of Israel”, and “defending Jews”, even though these are three separate things that may or may not coincide with each other (Venn diagram style.) Which of the three makes the soldier into a “Kadosh”? What about a Shomrim volunteer protecting Jews in Brooklyn? What about an Arab IDF soldier protecting a Bedouin settlement in the Negev inside Israel but outside Eretz Yisroel and with no Jews around? What about if the NK would establish a Chareidi Yishuv south of the Litani inside “EY” but outside Israel, and the Hezbollah would come to kill them, and they would go out in an ad-hoc posse with pitchforks etc. and one of them would be KIA ח״ו? Would he then be a קדוש because he “died defending EY”? Or does he have to be a ‘soldier’ לעיכובא?

Does anyone have any answers?