With wishes for a Good Shabbos, we at Operation Home Again are excited to share this week's newsletter.

• From The HOME Desk: Enjoy a brief update from behind the scenes at OHA.

   

• Calling Us HOME: Rav Levi Yitzchak Lederman emphatically calls out to his brothers in Chutz L'Aretz, encouraging them to come HOME.

   

• Welcome HOME: Rav Yitzchak Breitowitz shares Divrei Bracha at the welcoming event in Yerushalayim for the new Afula community. Rav Breitowitz suggests the proper mindset for aspiring Olim to have during their Aliyah process.

   

• Ha'Aretz Asher Areka: The first part in a series of translated excerpts from Rav Shnayor Burton's new sefer on Eretz Yisrael highlights Ramban's approach to the mitzvah of yishuv Eretz Yisrael.

• The Parsha Brings Us HOME - Mishpatim: Rabbi Reuven Shechter shares a Sforno encouraging Am Yisrael to take an active role in settling Eretz Yisrael.

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Please share with family and friends and help us inspire a return HOME.

שבת שלום וחדש טוב

Calling Us HOME 

Rav Levi Yitzchak Lederman, an established Talmid Chacham at the Mir Yeshiva, emphatically calls out to his brothers in Chutz L'Aretz, encouraging them to come HOME.

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The Torah has returned to Eretz Yisrael . . . today the opportunity for a person to live comfortably in Eretz Yisrael without facing the hardships that were required to do so during galus is available to every single Jew wherever he may be. [The time has come] to simply leave the lands of the nations, to leave the lands where Chazal say that those who live there are as if they have no G-D and to come and live in Eretz Yisrael and to לֶאֱכוֹל מִפִּרְיָהּ וְלִשְׂבּוֹעַ מִטּוּבָהּ and וּנְבָרְכָךְ עָלֶיהָ בִּקְדֻשָּׁה וּבְטָהֳרָה. 
 

We need to get down to the sources and see what they say. As we said, one who reads the Chumash, the pesukim, one who learns Navi - Yeshaya, Yirmiyah, Yechezkal, Trei Assar (Zechariah) and more - sees explicitly the message emanating from the pesukim: It’s ratzon Hashem that His children live in His house, ratzon Hashem that they live in His courtyard, ratzon Hashem that His children be in their proper place - in Eretz haKedoshah m’kol haAratzos, in the land that עֵינֵי יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ בָּהּ--מֵרֵשִׁית הַשָּׁנָה, וְעַד אַחֲרִית שָׁנָה. 

We should follow in the footsteps of the Avos, the Avos loved Eretz Yisrael - they desired Eretz Yisrael. 

!קוּם הִתְהַלֵּךְ בָּאָרֶץ לְאָרְכָּהּ וּלְרָחְבָּהּ כִּי לְךָ אֶתְּנֶנָּה

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(Translated from a shiur in a series Rav Lederman is giving on the topic of yishuv Eretz Yisrael. The full series can be seen on Kol HaLashon here.)

Welcome HOME 

Rav Yitzchak Breitowitz shares Divrei Bracha at the welcoming event in Yerushalayim for the new Afula community. Rav Breitowitz suggests the proper mindset for aspiring Olim to have during their Aliyah process.

 At the event, which took place shortly after Chanukah, Rav Breitowitz expands on the message of the small vessel of oil and how we can use this idea to strengthen ourselves during the Aliyah process.

Ha'Aretz Asher Areka

As we presented two weeks ago, we will be featuring a regular column with translated excerpts from the sefer Ha'Aretz Asher Areka by Rav Shnayor Burton.

Below is the translation of the first part of chapter 1.

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The Opinion of the Ramban

Residing in Eretz Yisrael is Counted as one of the 613 Mitzvos

The very first question we must ask when determining the correct course of action according to the Torah is: From where do you derive this? Where is the source in the Torah that we should reside in Eretz Yisrael?

Let us begin with the 613 mitzvos. Is residing in Eretz Yisrael a mitzvah in the Torah?

Ramban counted capturing and settling in Eretz Yisrael as one of the 613 mitzvos. He says:

That we were commanded to take possession of the land that God, may He be blessed and exalted, gave to our forefathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and we should not abandon it in the hands of other nations or leave it desolate. This is His saying to them: “And you shall take possession of the land and dwell in it, for to you I have given the land to take hold of it. And you shall settle the land by lot” (Numbers 33:53-54), and a similar idea of this mitzvah was repeated in other places, as His saying “Come and take possession of the land that I have sworn to your fathers” (Deuteronomy 1:8), and He specified it to them as part of this mitzvah, in its boundaries and borders, as it says, “and come to the high country of the Amorite and to all his neighbors, in the Arabah, in the high country, in the lowland, and in the Negev and on the shore of the sea” (ibid., 7) – that they should abandon no place of it. The proof that this is a mitzvah… this is what the sages call a “Milchemes Mitzvah” (Mishnah Sotah, 8:8). . . The commandment to capture the land is effective for all generations. And I say that the mitzvah which the sages praise, which is residing in EY, to the point that they said in Kesubos (110b) “Anyone who leaves it and resides outside of EY should be in your eyes like an idolater, as it says (1 Samuel 26:19) ‘For they have chased me today from joining Hashem’s inheritance, saying, “Go, serve other gods”,’ and other great statements that they said about it, are all from this positive commandment that we were commanded to possess the land and reside in it. Consequently, it is a positive commandment that is in force in all generations, and every individual is obligated by it, even during the era of exile, as is known in the Talmud in many places. The Sifre states (Deuteronomy, sec. 80): “Residing in Eretz Yisrael is equivalent to all the mitzvos”!

Ramban’s opinion is clear: It is a biblical positive commandment to capture and reside in Eretz Yisrael, which is why the Torah specified its boundaries and borders, like any other mitzvah-object detailed in the Torah. Even during the exilic era, “every individual is obligated by it.” We will return to clarifying his intention with these words and treat the question of how an exilic era is different from a redemptive era. But it is a positive commandment, in force in all generations, and therefore counted as a mitzvah from the 613 mitzvos said to Moses at Sinai. . .

Read the full article here.