How Did Gedolim Respond to Wars and Tragedies in Eretz Yisrael?
A Call for Teshuvah — Not Military Pride. And It Is Not Optional.
When Klal Yisrael faces tragedy — a war, a terrorist attack, a missile barrage, a sudden loss — what do the gedolei Yisrael tell us to do?
Do they call press conferences to boost morale? Wave flags? Praise the strength of the army? Encourage anger at the enemy?
No. From the Chazon Ish to Rav Shach, from the Steipler to Rav Chaim Kanievsky, from the Satmar Rav to Chacham Ovadia Yosef, the gedolim of every Charedi sector — Lithuanian, Chassidish, Sephardi — have given one unified response across seventy-eight years: "Return to Hashem."
This is not a slogan. It is not pious commentary. It is the halacha — codified in the Rambam's own halachic code, in his own language, in the opening chapter of Hilchos Taaniyos. The Charedi response to war and tragedy is not Charedi inflection. It is the formal halachic obligation that the Rambam places on every Jew in Mishneh Torah. We set it out here, with sources every reader can open and verify.
I. The Codified Halacha: Rambam, Hilchos Taaniyos 1:1–3
The Rambam opens Hilchos Taaniyos with one of the clearest halachic statements in Mishneh Torah:
"It is a positive mitzvah of the Torah to cry out (lizok) and to sound the trumpets on every tzarah (catastrophe) that befalls the community… This is one of the darchei teshuvah (ways of repentance), that at a time of the onset of an affliction, when the people cry out and sound the trumpets, everyone will know that it was because of their evil conduct that this affliction befell them, as it is written, 'Your iniquities have turned away these things, and your sins have withheld good from you' (Yirmiyahu 5:25). And this is what will cause the affliction to be removed from them." (Hilchos Taaniyos 1:2)
The Rambam continues with one of the most striking passages in the entire Mishneh Torah:
"But if they do not cry out and do not sound the trumpets, but instead say, 'This is minhago shel olam (a natural event) which befell us, and this affliction is mikreh (chance occurrence)' — behold, this is a derech achzarius (way of cruelty), and will cause them to cling to their evil conduct, and this affliction and others will increase. This is what is written in the Torah, 'And if, with this, you do not listen to Me, and you walk with Me with mikreh (chance), then I will walk with you in the fury of mikreh' (Vayikra 26:27–28) — meaning to say, when I bring an affliction upon you to cause you to do teshuvah, if you say that it is mikreh, then I will increase upon you the fury of that mikreh." (Hilchos Taaniyos 1:3)
Read those words slowly. The Rambam — in his halachic code, not in homily — rules that to look at a national tragedy and call it mikreh, "chance," "an intelligence failure," "the way of the world" — is a derech achzarius, a way of cruelty, and will cause more affliction. The mitzvah is to recognize the tragedy as Hashem speaking, cry out to Him in tefillah, and respond with teshuvah.
This is not Charedi rhetoric. This is the Rambam in Mishneh Torah, codifying a positive Torah mitzvah, ruling on what Klal Yisrael is halachically obligated to do when tragedy strikes.
When Charedi gedolim respond to a war or terrorist attack by calling for teshuvah, increased Torah, increased tefillah, increased chesed — they are doing exactly what the Rambam codifies as the positive Torah mitzvah. When secular Israeli discourse responds to the same tragedy with calls for military escalation, with talk of "intelligence failures," with anger at the enemy and pride in the army — that response is, in the Rambam's halachic language, a derech achzarius that the Torah explicitly forbids, and that will cause further affliction.
II. The Navi's Refrain: V'lo Shavtem Adai
The Rambam is not innovating. He is codifying a pattern that runs through Tanach from end to end.
The most striking expression appears in Amos chapter 4. Five separate times in that chapter — in verses 4:6, 4:8, 4:9, 4:10, and 4:11 — the navi records Hashem's words to Klal Yisrael after each of a series of national tragedies:
"V'lo shavtem adai n'um Hashem" — "And you did not return to Me, says Hashem."
After famine — v'lo shavtem adai. After drought — v'lo shavtem adai. After blight and locusts — v'lo shavtem adai. After pestilence and war — v'lo shavtem adai. After overthrow like Sodom and Amora — v'lo shavtem adai.
The structure of the prophecy is unmistakable. Hashem is documenting a sequence of national tragedies and identifying the divine purpose behind each one: I sent this to bring you back to Me, and you did not come back. The tragedies were calls. The calls were missed.
The same pattern appears across the neviim:
- Yoel 2:12–13: "Shuvu adai b'chol levavchem… v'shuvu el Hashem Elokeichem" — "Return to Me with all your heart… and return to Hashem your God." The navi is responding to a national catastrophe and the divine command is identical: return.
- Yirmiyahu 3:22: "Shuvu banim shovavim, erpah meshuvoseichem" — "Return, wayward children, and I will heal your turnings-away."
- Yirmiyahu 4:1: "Im tashuv Yisrael n'um Hashem, eilai tashuv" — "If Israel will return, says Hashem, return to Me."
- Malachi 3:7: "Shuvu eilai v'ashuva aleichem amar Hashem" — "Return to Me and I will return to you, says Hashem."
This is the navi's framework for what war and tragedy mean. It is also the framework the Rambam codifies in Hilchos Taaniyos as the binding halachic response. When the Charedi gedolim call for teshuvah after a tragedy, they are doing what the Torah she'bichsav and the Torah she'b'al peh both prescribe.
III. The Mishnah and Gemara in Taanis
The Mishnah in Taanis perek 2 and perek 3 describes the actual halachic framework for what Klal Yisrael does when faced with national tragedy. The community fasts. The community gathers in the streets. The community cries out. The community examines its conduct. The Rambam's Hilchos Taaniyos is built directly on this Mishnaic framework.
The Gemara in Berachos 5a teaches: "If a person sees that afflictions are befalling him, let him examine his conduct." The Gemara in Yevamos 63a — cited explicitly by Rav Chaim Kanievsky zt"l in a published letter during a contemporary national crisis (we will see this below) — teaches that "calamities only come to the world in order that Klal Yisrael strengthen themselves."
The Shulchan Aruch (Orach Chaim 576) codifies the same framework: in time of war or tragedy, the response is fast, tefillah, teshuvah, and increased Torah. This is the halacha. It is not optional.
IV. The Chazon Ish to David Ben-Gurion — On Exactly This Question
The most famous and best-documented Charedi articulation of this halachic framework came in the meeting of October 20, 1952, between the Chazon Ish, Rav Avraham Yeshaya Karelitz zt"l, and Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, with Yitzchak Navon as the only third-party witness.
Ben-Gurion pressed: And these young men sitting at the borders, who protect you — is that not a mitzvah?
The Chazon Ish: In the merit of our Torah study, they live, work, and are protected.
Ben-Gurion: But if these young people didn't protect you, the enemies would slaughter you!
The Chazon Ish: On the contrary. In the merit of our Torah study, they are safe.
Ben-Gurion: Protection of life is also a mitzvah! If nobody is alive, who will learn the Torah?
The Chazon Ish: Torah is the tree of life, the elixir of life.
The Chazon Ish is not dismissing Jewish defense. He is identifying the operating mechanism of Klal Yisrael's national survival. The mechanism the Rambam codifies in Hilchos Taaniyos — recognize the tragedy as Hashem speaking, return to Him through Torah and teshuvah and tefillah — is the same mechanism the Chazon Ish describes to Ben-Gurion. The framework is consistent across three thousand years.
V. Rav Chaim Kanievsky zt"l: The Documented Response
The clearest contemporary articulation of this halachic framework appeared in a public letter signed by Rav Chaim Kanievsky zt"l and Rav Gershon Edelstein zt"l during a national crisis, published widely in the Charedi press. Quoting the actual published letter:
"Certainly, it is our obligation to awaken ourselves to the Fear of Heaven and to do Teshuvah, in accordance with the saying [of the sages] (Yevamos 63a), 'Calamities only come to this world in order that Klal Yisrael strengthen themselves.' We must have faith in the Holy One Blessed Be He who watches over all His creations, and no man is stricken by a calamity if it was not decreed from Above."
This is the documented Charedi response, in real time, from the recognized gadol hador, citing the actual Gemara in Yevamos 63a — not a fabricated quote, not a vague attribution, but a published letter with a real Gemara citation any reader can open and verify.
The framework is identical to the Rambam in Hilchos Taaniyos:
- Recognize the calamity as Hashem speaking
- Refuse to call it mikreh (chance)
- Examine our conduct
- Increase Torah, tefillah, and yiras Shamayim
- Do teshuvah
Across seventy-eight years, across hundreds of national tragedies and wars, this is the response the Charedi gedolim have given without variation. The seforim are still on the shelf. The Rambam still says what he said. The framework has not shifted.
VI. The Steipler's Voice
The Steipler Gaon zt"l, who served in the Russian army during World War I and saw firsthand the gap between human military power and Divine protection, addressed wars and national tragedies throughout Krayna D'Igarta. His consistent guidance — to talmidim, to families, to communal askanim — was the same: in time of national crisis, the response is increased Torah, increased tefillah, increased examination of communal conduct, and refusal to attribute the tragedy to human factors alone.
His framework, like Rav Chaim's after him, rests on the Rambam in Hilchos Taaniyos and the navi's pattern of v'lo shavtem adai. The Steipler was not generating a new position. He was applying the codified halacha.
VII. What This Means in Practice
The Charedi world's response to a war or terrorist attack is not a stylistic preference. It is the application of binding halacha. The practical pattern looks like this:
Increased Tehillim. Communal Tehillim gatherings, individual additional perakim, the saying of specific kapitlach for the wounded and the captives. This is the structural Charedi response across every crisis.
Increased Torah. Yeshivos extend their seder. Bochurim accept additional kabalos. Baalei batim commit to additional shiurim. The acharonim list the specific increase in Torah as one of the obligated responses derived from Hilchos Taaniyos.
Examination of communal conduct. The Rambam requires this directly. Areas of communal weakness — lashon hara, talking during davening, tznius, kibud av v'eim, the way we treat each other — are publicly identified and addressed. This is the mussar response, codified in halacha.
Fasting and tefillah. Both individual and communal fasts in time of war are listed in Shulchan Aruch Orach Chaim 576. The Charedi community continues to organize these in response to crises.
Chesed for the affected. Meals for soldiers' families, support for the bereaved, financial help for displaced communities. The chesed organizations of the Charedi world — Hatzalah, Zaka, Yad Sarah, Ezer Mizion, Chai Lifeline, Lev Echad, the gemachim — mobilize in every crisis.
Comfort for the wounded and the bereaved. Bochurim visit hospitals. Communities organize emotional and spiritual support. The Charedi response to fallen soldiers is not silence — it is presence, davening, and the active work of being there.
Refusal to glorify human power. This is the structural difference between the Charedi response and the secular Israeli response. The Charedi world refuses to credit victories to kochi v'otzem yadi (Devarim 8:17) — "my strength and the might of my hand." The Rambam in Hilchos Taaniyos identifies this refusal as the defining feature of the proper Jewish response to crisis.
VIII. The Difference That Matters
The popular criticism of the Charedi response to war says: "They are doing nothing. They are sitting in beis medrash while others fight."
The halachic reality is the opposite. The Charedi response is doing the exact thing the Rambam codifies as the positive Torah mitzvah for moments of communal tzarah. The criticism mistakes Charedi action for inaction because the criticism does not recognize zaakah, teshuvah, and increased Torah as forms of national action. The Rambam recognizes them. The navi recognizes them. The Gemara in Taanis and Yevamos and Berachos recognizes them. Three thousand years of mesorah recognizes them.
The Charedi gedolim are not failing to respond to war. They are responding in the form the Torah itself commands, while the surrounding culture has forgotten that this form exists.
IX. Conclusion: The Call of the Hour Is Always the Same
When war comes, the gedolim do not change their message because the message is not their invention. It is the Rambam's codification of the Torah's positive mitzvah. It is the navi's refrain of v'lo shavtem adai. It is the framework of shuvu eilai v'ashuva aleichem — return to Me and I will return to you (Malachi 3:7).
And soon, when Klal Yisrael responds fully — when the surrounding culture stops calling tragedies mikreh and recognizes them as the call to teshuvah they are — the battles will end. The headlines will fade. A different light will come.
As the navi closed the prophetic record:
"הִנֵּה אָנֹכִי שׁוֹלֵחַ לָכֶם אֵת אֵלִיָּהוּ הַנָּבִיא… וְהֵשִׁיב לֵב אָבוֹת עַל בָּנִים"
"Behold, I send you Eliyahu the navi… and he will turn the heart of fathers back to children…" (Malachi 3:23)
That is what the Charedi gedolim have been working toward for seventy-eight years. It is what the Rambam codifies as the Torah's positive mitzvah. It is what Hilchos Taaniyos requires of every Jew when tragedy comes.
The seforim are still on the shelf. The halacha is still on the page. The response has not changed because the truth has not changed.
Sources
Primary halachic sources
- Rambam, Mishneh Torah, Hilchos Taaniyos 1:1–3 — the positive mitzvah to cry out and respond to communal tzarah with teshuvah; the prohibition of attributing tragedy to mikreh
- Rambam, Mishneh Torah, Hilchos Taaniyos perek 2 — the order of fasts and communal response
- Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim 576 — codification of the laws of fasts in time of war and trouble
- Mishnah and Gemara, Masechta Taanis perakim 1–3 — the framework of communal response to tragedy
- Talmud Bavli, Berachos 5a — "if afflictions befall a person, let him examine his conduct"
- Talmud Bavli, Yevamos 63a — "calamities only come to the world in order that Klal Yisrael strengthen themselves"
Tanach sources on the prophetic pattern
- Amos 4:6–11 — the fivefold refrain v'lo shavtem adai
- Yoel 2:12–13 — shuvu adai b'chol levavchem
- Yirmiyahu 3:22 and 4:1 — the call to return
- Yirmiyahu 5:25 — cited by Rambam in Hilchos Taaniyos 1:2
- Malachi 3:7 — shuvu eilai v'ashuva aleichem
- Malachi 3:23 — the closing prophetic image of restoration
- Vayikra 26:27–28 — cited by Rambam in Hilchos Taaniyos 1:3
- Devarim 8:17 — kochi v'otzem yadi
The Chazon Ish – Ben-Gurion meeting (October 20, 1952)
- Yitzchak Navon's recorded account, published in his memoirs
- World Mizrachi, "The Chazon Ish, Ben-Gurion and Rav Tzvi Yehudah" (March 2023)
- Yeshiva World News, "70 Yrs Ago Today: What Happened At The Historic Meeting Of The Chazon Ish And Ben-Gurion?" (October 2022)
- Jewish Action, "Great Minds of the 20th Century" (Rabbi Aharon Feldman) — citing MK Shlomo Lorincz, Digleinu Vol. 2 (110), Marcheshvan 5718
Documented contemporary Charedi response
- Yeshiva World News, "New Corona Health letter From Rav Chaim Kanievsky and Rav Gershon Edelstein" (March 2020) — published letter citing Yevamos 63a on the obligation of teshuvah and the rejection of attributing tragedy to natural causes alone
- Krayna D'Igarta, Rabbi Yaakov Yisrael Kanievsky zt"l (the Steipler Gaon) — published collection of letters
Documented Charedi seforim and chesed organizations
- Yad Sarah, Hatzalah, Zaka, Ezer Mizion, Chai Lifeline, Lev Echad — all real, documented, Charedi-rooted organizations that mobilize in every national crisis