[Avodah] When Should a Rabbi Speak (was Are We Trying To Grow?)

[Akiva Miller]

.
R' Yitzchok Levine wrote:

> I am not in favor of a rabbi speaking DURING davening on
> Shabbos or Yom Tov mornings.  However, I am in favor of a rabbi
> speaking and writing about important issues during shiurim or
> shmusen that are given say a half hour before davening or in
> the evening during the week. If this is what a rabbi does, then
> one has the choice of going to listen to him or not, instead of
> being a captive audience and being forced to endure a long
> Shabbos or Yom Tov morning davening.

> And let me add that speeches during davening are a relative new
> innovation, and were not welcome by many when introduced.

I'd like to learn more about the perspective of the anti-speech crowd.

My understanding is that there were many in the Torah leadership who felt
that a weekly Shabbos morning sermon was assur, being an innovation that
imitates what the non-Jews were doing. To me, this is an entirely
reasonable view (as long as it is kept separate from the question of
"Perhaps it is worth doing anyway").

My question, I suppose, is a historical one: What were our communities like
in the very long era before the weekly speech became established? In fact,
can someone please educate me about how things are currently, in those
communities where such things are not done even today?

No community is monolithic. Every community contains a wide spectrum of
people, ranging from those who are active and interested, to those who are
detached and uninterested. How do we reach out to the uninterested?

It is natural that those who are active and interested will attend a fair
number of shiurim and such. It is also natural that those who are detached
and uninterested will opt out of these events. Over our many centuries, how
did we reach those people?

My guess is that there was no real need to reach out to them. In the
pre-modern world, where for various sociological reasons the Jews stuck to
themselves, Jewish values and Jewish knowledge were imparted naturally by
osmosis, without any need for a weekly captive audience. Exceptions were
made for special occasions, notably the Shabbos Hagadol and Shabbos Shuva
sermons, where even the average person needed some extra input (even at the
risk of forcing the above-average person to endure a long drasha).

But now, in the modern, fragmented world, we cannot rely on sociological
factors to instill Jewishness, and so the same reasons that allowed the
twice-a-year drasha now allowed the weekly sermon. And in those communities
which are tight-knit even today, this is not needed as much, or perhaps
even at all.

Perhaps I've answered my own question. In places where there are many shuls
to choose from, it is easier for every individual to find the one which
meets his spiritual needs best, and the weekly speech is unnecessary. But
where the choices are limited, this is more difficult and less likely, so
each shul needs to be more innovative in how it reaches out to the
less-interested people, and providing the captive audience with a
hopefully-interesting speech can be one of those tools.

I must stress the "hopefully-interesting" aspect. No speaker in the world
intends to bore his audience. To use the tools suggested by the Baal
Haggada: Even when we speak to the rasha, the goal must be to wake him up,
and not drive him away. As the Lubavitcher Rebbe explained, we must always
keep in mind that the rasha is indeed at the Seder, unlike his brother -
the Fifth Son - who didn't even show up.

Akiva Miller
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