HaRav Yitzchak Zilberstein: “Carrying Guns Is Not The Proper Hishtadulus”

 

With all due respect for Rabbi Yitzchak Zilberstein, someone please remind Rabbi Zilberstein about these two teachings of Chazal:

Babylonian Talmud, tractate Sanhedrin, page 72A:
If you see someone coming to kill you, then arise and kill him first.

Babylonian Talmud, tractate Pesachim, page 64B:
It is forbidden to rely on miracles.

In 1929 , the righteous students of the Chevron Yeshivah (HYD) were brutally murdered by wicked bloodthirsty Muslims. If those students would have had guns, they might have lived.

Before the Nazis threw millions of innocent Jews [and non-Jews] into the death camps, they first made gun ownership illegal, and took-away the guns of all German citizens. Then they were able to kill innocent people by the millions.

 Is he even aware of all the Bnei Torah being killed recently? 

The Torah learning didn’t protect them. Perhaps an armed shul-goer, doing his histadlus, might have helped. In Har Nof the victims were still wearing their Talls & Tefillin!

 Comparing a terrorist shooting the front of a shul to rockets being launched from Gaza is apples to oranges. Didn’t see how that was relevant. Yes, israel has rockets to shoot down rockets. But the iron dome doesn’t protect against bad guys shooting in shuls or ramming bus stops.

Rav Yitzchak Zilberstein was asked a shaila by a Bnei Brak avreich who wrote that he is is scared to go to shul on Shabbos with his children as no one in the shul carries a gun.

“I checked out the possibility of obtaining a gun from the police for Shabatos and Yamim Tovim and they told me that they have a condition that I volunteer in the Bnei Brak civil guard for 45 hours a month,” the avreich wrote. “That would mean patrolling the streets in a car in certain areas and then I could receive a gun license. It would be at night so it wouldn’t be on the cheshbon of my learning in kollel. Is it appropriate for me to do this?” the avreich asked.

HaRav Zilberstein responded: “It’s chaval that even within the tzibur of Bnei Torah, there are those who aren’t sufficiently aware of the chashivus of their limmud and don’t sufficiently believe in themselves, how much Torah protects Am Yisrael.”

“Today, there’s the Iron Dome system, one of the most sophisticated systems that Hakadosh Baruch Hu has given to the intelligent, a system that is capable of identifying rocket launches and detonating them while they’re still in the air – we have to thank Hakadosh Baruch Hu for this wonderful wisdom.”

“Imagine if someone would say to the operators of the Iron Dome: ‘Chaval on this wonderful system – I’ll go with a weapon and if I see someone about to launch a missile, I’ll take care of him with my weapon.’ They would say to him: ‘You’re a complete fool. This system protects the entire country from every area where they launch missiles. You, with your weapon, can perhaps protect one area, and even that, you probably can’t do.”

“A person who learns Torah knows that when he learns Torah, he spreads the perfect protection of the Torah over himself and his entire city which protects from all harm, like it says in the Gemara in Sotah, that the Torah protects and saves.”

“When they asked my brother-in-law, HaGaon HaRav Chaim Kanievsky, z’tl during the Gulf War whether to leave Bnei Brak, he said that it says in the Navi (מלכים ב, ו טו) that the king Aram sent an entire army in order to capture Elisha, and it’s written: ‘And the servant of the Ish Elokim got up early and went out, and behold an army with horses and chariots was surrounding the city. And his attendant said to him: ‘Adoni, what will we do?’ And he said to him: ‘Don’t fear for those who are with us are more numerous than those who are with them.’ And Elisha davened and said: ‘Hashem, open his eyes and let him see. And Hashem opened his eyes and he saw, and behold the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire around Elisha.'”

“Who were these who were protecting Elisha? It was the Torah he learned, that’s what protected him. And also today, a million pages of Gemara are protecting the city but we don’t have the Navi to open our eyes to see it.”

“Additionally, we must be aware of what the Ohr Somayach said at the time of World War I, that every bullet has an address – and there’s no chance of someone being injured if the bullet wasn’t intended for him. And nothing will help the person the bullet is intended for, even if he is in a protected place he’ll still be injured there. And even if there was a police station right next to a place where it was decreed that there will be a terror attack, all the armed police officers won’t be there and will only arrive after the terrorist completes what was decreed from Shamayim.”

“But we have a mitzva to do hishtadulus and there’s an issur to go to a makom sakanah because the Satan prosecutes at a time of sakanah. And therefore when the issues are relevant to our actions, we must consider the crux of the matter – is this hishtadlus that Hakadosh Baruch Hu wants from us, that we close our Gemaros so we can go out with weapons? Surely not, this isn’t the desired hishtadlus. On the contrary, when there are terror attacks, Hakadosh Baruch Hu is hinting to us to be mechazeik in Torah and yiras Shamayim. Hakadosh Baruch Hu doesn’t bring terror attacks in order to hint to us to arm ourselves.”

“The second thing is to consider whether a shul where there are no weapons can be called a makom sakanah. And the answer is no, every normal place has a certain amount of sakanah, whether there are weapons there or not. But it’s not such a danger that we’re afraid to go there, and on the contrary, a makom tefillah is an especially protected place where we daven to Hashem to save us from all harsh and cruel decrees. And when there’s an attack in a shul or near a shul, it’s a siman that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is asking us to be mechazeik ourselves even more in Torah and tefillah. These are the true weapons of Am Yisrael,” HaRav Zilberstein emphasized.