[Avodah] Holiness of (Eretz) Israel

[Yisrael Medad]

Regarding the two issues of 1- The Jewishness of the Medinah (whether Jews
having sovereignty makes the state Jewish) and 2- Qedushas ha'aretz

I would suggest a new book, Nachlat Yaakov, 2 Vols., 930 pgs. which, among
other topics, devotes, for example, 100 pages to the inyan of the three
oaths.

And to the point of the topic currently under discussion, the Gemera of Moed
Katan, 26A, reads that kri'ah should be done for "the cities of Judea, the
Mikdash and Yerushalyim" from which one can infer that these are three
separate matters in that each one merits the ceremony for something
intrinsic of each, i.e., although they are equally treated by kri'ah, there
are three distinct reasons why so or, on the other hand, while one might
think that they are at different levels, the decision is that they are
indeed equal after all.

There is an addition by Rabbi Chelbo there who adds a stipulation "in their
destruction" and the question is what is the definition of such status?  Is
it no Jews living there?  Is it physical destruction?  Or is it "kol she'yad
ha'ummot sholetet alav" - if sovereignty or its equivalent is in the nads of
the non-Jew?  For example, Jericho or Shchem today in that the ruling
authority has been recognized as an institution termed the Palestine
National Authority?  The Satmar Rav, R' Yoelisch z"l, considered a secular
Jewish government as worse ("elah adraba garua achshav b'otah
memshalah...d'galut ha'erev-rav kasha yoter m'galut ha'ummot" - Divrei Yoel,
O"H, 30:6).

The author, Rav Yaakov Zisberg, concludes that those cities administered by
the PNA do not require kri'ah unless an actual state is established by the
PNA.

-- 
Yisrael Medad
Shiloh
Mobile Post Efraim 44830
Israel
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.aishdas.org/pipermail/avodah-aishdas.org/attachments/20061126/f57e1376/attachment-0001.htm>