Two months ago, I wrote an article for The Jewish Press titled “No, Rabbi Kahane was not a Racist.” Some asked me afterwards why I defended Rav Kahane given that the vast majority of the Jewish world rejected his views.
Let me begin by sharing an insight Dr. Abraham Joshua Heschel makes in A Passion for Truth – his book on Rav Menachem Mendel of Kotzk and, lehavdil, Kierkegaard. He writes that the Kotzker’s extreme and unforgiving desire for truth was too much for most people. Many couldn’t tolerate him, and he couldn’t tolerate them. Yet, he remains a vital influence on the Jewish people. His memory serves as an instant needle to prick the balloon of any overblown sense of self; his teachings make one realize what a flawed creature one really is.
Dr. Heschel’s point has haunted me throughout the years. Rav Kahane was extreme. He seemed to care not a whit what people thought of him. He was fearless, he was deeply insightful, and he spoke and stood for truths that many deep down agreed with but were afraid to say openly.
Many feared supporting him or believed the time wasn’t right for his message. Yet, they appreciated that – like a lighthouse – he shone the light of truth. They appreciated him reminding them that political correctness was hiding a dangerous reality – that liberal Judaism, secular Zionism, and intellectual elites are spiritually killing many more Jews than Hitler, yemach shemo, ever did, and that we lemmings are too genteel to do anything about it.
Rav Kahane initially gained fame by starting the Jewish Defense League and defending forgotten Jews. But his main message was that Jews should feel pride in who they are and stand up for themselves. That the time of cowering before non-Jews was over. That we should no longer be held back by fear of what the goyim will think.
His first, and probably most important, book, Never Again, was misunderstood. I remember one of my rabbeim in yeshiva delivering a mussar schmooze during which he exclaimed, “‘Never Again’ is apikorsus!” Our fate is in the hands of the Ribbon Shel Olam. Does Kahane think he could have prevented the Holocaust?”
But Rav Kahane never said he could. What he argued was that the American Jewish establishment was guilty of doing virtually nothing to get Roosevelt to bomb the tracks to Auschwitz, to allow the St. Louis to land on American shores, or to otherwise save what could be saved. They were too busy thinking, “What will the goyim say?”
Kahane refused to accept the status quo. He rejected the “wisdom” of being quiet and waiting for great people who will perhaps do something behind the scenes if they are given enough kavod and endless time. He knew Jews needed to be defended now. He knew Israel had to stand up for itself now.
Kahane was not a rabble-rouser seeking trouble (although, unfortunately, he did attract followers of that sort whom he was not always able to keep in line). He was a Jew who loved other Jews with every fiber of his being and could not stand what was being done to them, most often by their fellow Jews.
He hated how Reform and Conservative (and some Orthodox) leaders were destroying the neshamos of young Jews. (Hence his work Why Be Jewish?, an incredibly effective reflection on intermarriage, which includes the best chapter title ever written: “Artists, Intellectuals, and Imbeciles.”) He hated what the Israeli government did to Yemenite Jews and so many Sephardic Jews, who voted for him in droves.
Kahane wanted to wake up sleeping Jews. He wanted to rouse us out of our apathy, laziness, and irresponsibility to stand up for other Jews.
In the early 1980s, Kahane wrote They Must Go. Was he right about the need to expel all Arabs from Israel? I don’t know. As I write these words, three pleasant Arab women are cleaning my house downstairs. We talk to each other and exchange pleasantries. I am not worried that they will do anything to my family. (They are not like the Arabs of East Jerusalem or Yehuda and Shomron who are raised on hatred and incitement.) But many in Israel saw him as a voice of truth, standing up to starry-eyed dreamers who gave us Oslo and intifadas. Many say that if we had listened to him, many of today’s problems would not exist.
Why was he vehemently rejected by so many people? Partially because they hated him for speaking truth and partially because they feared his popularity. He was predicted to get up to 10 seats in the 1988 election, so they took him out of the game by declaring him a racist.
I once attended a talk he gave for yeshiva bachurim in Yerushalayim. After his stirring remarks, I asked, “Everything you say sounds true, but as far as I know, none of the gedolim agree with you or your derech – is that not a problem?”
He replied, “First of all, many of them do agree with me privately, but for one reason or another will not say so publicly” (a fact that has since been amply documented). “But more importantly, although we have gedolim today, we do not have manhigim. They speak out, but only reactively, never proactively to anything outside the limited concerns of the frum community. Given that they refuse to lead, b’makom she’ein ish, hishtadel liyot ish. That’s why I do what I do.”
In summary, Rav Kahane was a fearless leader who taught true pride in Judaism, the Torah, and the Jewish people. In Israel, they may continue to slander him and his supporters, but the truth will ultimately prevail.