The following is a transcript of the Rebbe's remarks given in a private
meeting on Av 5, 5727 (August 12, 1967), shortly after the Six-Day War, as
recalled by Rabbi Chaim Gutnick of Melbourne, Australia, and published (in
Hebrew) in Kfar Chabad Magazine, issue no. 806:
...Three times in our generation, G-d has granted us an opportunity for the
beginning of the Redemption. But these opportunities were missed, and it is the
Jewish leadership which is to blame.
The first opportunity was in 1948. You know that I have a particular
enthusiasm for Rashi's commentary on the Torah. Well, Rashi says regarding the
waters of the Flood that, at first, G-d brought down "rains of blessing"1 upon
them and waited to see if they would repent; only after they failed to do so did
this turn into the very opposite of "rains of blessing," G-d forbid.2
In 1948, G-d sent "rains of blessing." This was a time when even the Russians
supported the Jewish people against the British, who had attempted to annihilate
the nation of Israel. This was a time of opportunity. But the Jewish leaders
stood by and debated whether or not to make mention of G-d's name in the
"Declaration of Establishment."3 Thus the Redemption was put off by fifty years.
The second opportunity was the Sinai Campaign [of 1956]. If the Jewish
people would have believed that their salvation would come from G-d rather than
from French MIGs and British warplanes, all would have been different.
But never has there been an opportunity such as this one. This was a war won
by Torah and mitzvot. There can be no doubt of this. A Jew in Moscow recited
Psalms, and a Jew in Buffalo, New York, put on tefillin, and this helped
the Jews defeat their enemies in the Land of Israel.
If the Jewish leaders would have utilized the opportunity to rouse the people
to the observance of Torah and mitzvot, our situation today would be entirely
different. Think about it: a young man in Israel was summoned, handed an Uzi,
and told: "Leave your wife and children at home and go to El-Arish to fight." In
every war there are draft-dodgers; here, no Jew, not even one for whom the word
"Jew" is nothing more than an appellation, refused to fight. It was a time when
the entire people of Israel were in a state of "We shall do and we shall hear."4
When this young man fought at El-Arish, his Torah and mitzvot fought for him.
The Shechinah (Divine Presence) came down into the trenches to assist the
soldier fighting on the borders of the Land of Israel.
If the Jewish leaders would have told that soldier to utilize the reserves of
faith and courage that were revealed in him during the war toward a commitment
to Torah and mitzvot, with the same "We shall do and we shall hear," he, and the
entire Jewish nation, would have responded, and everything would have been
different. But again the leaders were silent, and the great opportunity was
lost. They were too timid to tell the Jew the truth: that this is the time for a
return to Torah.
The very first chapter of the first section of the Shulchan Aruch
(Code of Jewish Law) begins not with Maimonides' "Thirteen Principles of Faith,"
but with the Rama's ruling that "One should not be intimidated by mockers." Why?
Because when one does not fulfill this rule, one is prevented from fulfilling
the entire Shulchan Aruch. Perhaps I speak too sharply, but the Jewish
leadership is bankrupt. They avoid me because they know that I will demand of
them to speak the truth. Their timidness to speak the truth, contrary to the
rule, "One should not be intimidated by mockers," is holding back the
Redemption.
Jews must be told to keep Torah and mitzvot. I initiated the tefillin
campaign--this is only the beginning. My hope is that through the mitzvah of
tefillin, the Jewish people will be brought closer to other mitzvot--to keep
kosher and Shabbat, and ultimately the entire Torah. My aim is that millions of
additional hands should become tefillin-wearing hands.
The Jewish people will respond when spoken to about Torah and mitzvot. Not
only teenagers--also forty-year-olds, people advanced and established in their
lives, are ready to hear the truth, if only their leaders will speak it to them.
We still have not lost the opportunity. It's still not too late. Now it is
August.5 If we will do our job,
if the shluchim6 will do
their job and tell the world the truth, we can bring the Redemption...
