Reflections on Divine Providence for the Tenth Anniversary of Israel’s Founding

In a sermon given on the eve of Yom Ha-Atsma’ut in 1958, Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik considered the previous decade of Israel’s existence from a theological perspective, and responded—for the most part indirectly—to the arguments put forward by religious opponents of Zionism. Drawing on the story of the biblical Abraham’s troubled years in the land of Canaan, Soloveitchik asserted that the young country’s troubles should be proof that its establishment was the fulfilment of God’s will. He responded to the naysayers by confessing that he “cannot understand . . . how Jews can have the temerity to choose someplace in exile to protest the Land of Israel.” (Video, Yiddish with English subtitles, 14 minutes.)