Ben-Zakai and Akiva's differing approaches to defense and diplomacy - opinion

Names apparently influence the consciousness of people and the organizations that bear them, as well as the attitudes of others toward them.

This is why a company that wants to alter its image may change its name, or people who wish to be seen differently insist that their family and friends refrain from using a childhood nickname.

I was active in Bnei Akiva, the religious Zionist youth movement named for Rabbi Akiva, the spiritual leader of the Bar-Kochba revolt (132 CE) that was marked beginning this past Saturday night, inter alia, with bonfires. I wonder: If the movement had another name, say Sons of Zakai, would Israel today be different?

Two great scholars with differing approaches

Akiva and Yohanan Ben-Zakai were great scholars and great leaders operating during the Judean rebellions against Rome, but their approaches to defense and diplomacy differed widely.

During the Great Revolt (66–74 CE), after extremists burnt the storehouses of Jerusalem, Ben-Zakai saw people cooking straw to obtain nutrition from its water.

He concluded that it is impossible to fight without adequate material means and that there was no choice but to come to an agreement with the enemy.

In a cleverly contrived meeting with Vespasian, he asked the Roman ruler: “Give me Yavne and its wise men.” After the destruction of the Temple, guidelines from Yavne provided a framework that enabled our continued national and religious existence in the Land of Israel and the Diaspora.

Ben-Zakai operated around the time of Masada, a tale of suicide that has become a national myth. True, it was a proud death, but nevertheless an end. Some 60 years later, the Bar-Kochba Revolt, which was to become another national myth, broke out.

Rabbi Akiva, the foremost religious leader of the period, threw his moral and spiritual weight behind the revolt and deemed Bar-Kochba the messiah.

After the military leader died, Akiva withdrew that assessment. However, it is unclear if he regretted his support of the revolt.

Despite the huge damage it caused, it was the Bar-Kochba Revolt, and not the Great Revolt that preceded it, which was the main trigger for the destruction of Jewish life in the Land of Israel and almost 2,000 years of exile. (For the record, I am not criticizing Akiva’s decisions in real-time, as it is impossible to know while events are unfolding where they will lead.)

Ninety-five years ago, a religious youth movement was established. Due to Rabbi Akiva’s courage and his dedication to Torah, it was named for him.

Generations of religious Zionist youth learned of his admiration of Bar-Kochba and his fighters, but probably did not hear much about strategic considerations, balance of power, and the cost of ignoring them.

Does this explain why their successors do not seem perturbed by Israel’s lowered credit ratings? Unlike Rabbi Ben-Zakai, they seem to believe that it is possible to fight on the equivalent of water in which straw was cooked.

Dedication will enable us to confront much larger forces, without external support, say of America.

Demography in the Land of Israel? Consequences of an Arab majority between the river and the sea? These are for those of little faith, not those whose consciousness was forged by tales of Bar-Kochba, the “almost messiah,” and his admirer Rabbi Akiva.

I wonder where would religious Zionism be today if the movement had borne the name of Ben-Zakai and its graduates internalized this leader’s pragmatism?

And what would Israel’s security and diplomatic situation be, given the sector’s increasing influence on the country? One can but imagine, and be sad.

The writer was Israel’s first ambassador to the Baltic states after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, ambassador to South Africa, and congressional liaison officer at the embassy in Washington. She is a graduate of Israel’s National Defense College.