Now G-d Will Act

A national day of fasting and prayer has been declared by both Ashkenazi and Sephardic former Chief Rabbis of Israel. The event is to be held from sun up to sundown on 6 Adar II/March 17th. The date corresponds to the death of Moses, who led the Israelites to the promised land and commanded them to enter into it. It is also the day that the Knesset will vote as to whether or not the disengagement plan will require a nation-wide referendum vote for implementation. Opponents of the pullout see the vote as their last means of legislative protest.

After the day of prayer and fasting was announced, another article appeared on Arutz Sheva (israelnationalnews.com) that detailed the Sanhedrin's official response to the Disengagement Plan. The Sanhedrin, Judaism's highest legal-religious tribunal, existed until 425 AD. The modern incarnation, which models itself after its ancestor, was established last year and consists of 71 members. After performing halakhic (Jewish legal) analysis on the Disengagement plan, the Sanhedrin issued the following declaration.

As printed on Israel National News (Headline: Sanhedrin's Declaration Concerning the Disengagement) this past Tuesday, March 8, 2005:

The Sanhedrin’s Declaration Concerning the Disengagement
27 Adar 5765/March 8, 2005

* The disengagement plan, involving the uprooting of Jewish communities in Gaza and Samaria and the abandonment of these areas to a foreign entity, is in direct contradiction to the Torah of Israel, and is null and void. Future governments of Israel will have to re-conquer the areas in question.

* The decision to implement the uprooting will cause large numbers of Jews to transgress many of the Torah's commandments.

* The Government of Israel and the Knesset, in their present form and power structure, are institutions that have no authority according to Jewish Law to render decisions that contradict the Torah of Israel.

* No Jew is permitted to cooperate with the program of uprooting, in any way whatsoever.

* Any Jew – including a soldier or policeman – who supports the uprooting, whether directly or indirectly, whether by voting in its favor, or by giving counsel, or by supplying vehicles or materials, and certainly anyone who actively participates in the uprooting, thus transgresses a large number of Torah commandments, such as not standing idly by one's neighbor's blood (Lev. 19,17).

* The uprooting of the residents of the Gaza Strip and Samaria is a crime and an injustice to the residents, and places many other communities – in fact, all citizens of the State of Israel – in mortal danger.

* By this declaration, the Sanhedrin, as the link of continuity of the Torah received by Moses at Sinai, hereby expresses the stance of Israel's Torah... The Sanhedrin, as the representative of the Jewish people throughout history, hereby affirms that the Jewish people -- regardless of this or that government -- does not relinquish, and is not entitled to relinquish, so much as the span of a solitary man's foot of the Land of Israel according to its Biblical boundaries, for it is G-d's land.

They're following the rules. They're recognizing that the land is G-d's gift to His people, and that neither they nor anyone else have a right to play with G-d's design. They're following legal channels. They're praying for G-d's intervention. Watch. The miraculous is about to begin.

Spring is almost here...