Everything about Abraham Isaac Kook totally explained
Abraham Isaac Kook (
1865–
1935) was the first
Ashkenazi chief rabbi of the British
Mandate for Palestine, the founder of the
Religious Zionist Yeshiva Merkaz HaRav, Jewish
thinker,
Halachist,
Kabbalist and a renowned
Torah scholar. He is known in
Hebrew as הרב אברהם יצחק הכהן קוק
HaRav Avraham Yitzchak HaCohen Kook, and by the
acronym HaRaAYaH or simply as "HaRav." He was one of the most celebrated and influential Rabbis of the 20th century.
Biography
Kook was born in
Grīva,
Latvia (now part of
Daugavpils, then a town in
Courland Governorate of
Imperial Russia) in
1865, the oldest of eight children. His father, Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Ha-Cohen Kook, was a student of the
Volozhin Yeshiva, the "mother of the
Lithuanian yeshivas", whereas his maternal grandfather was a member of the
Kapust dynasty of the
Hassidic movement.
As a child he gained a reputation of being an
ilui (
prodigy). He entered the Volozhin yeshiva in
1884 at the age of 18, where he became close to the
rosh yeshiva, Rabbi
Naftali Zvi Yehuda Berlin (the
Netziv). Although he stayed at the yeshiva for only a year and a half, the Netziv has been quoted as saying that if the Volozhin Yeshiva had been founded just to educate Rav Kook, it would have been worthwhile. During his time in the yeshiva, he studied about 18 hours a day.
In
1886, Kook married Batsheva, the daughter of Rabbi
Eliyahu David Rabinowitz-Teomim, (also known as the
Aderet), the rabbi of
Ponevezh (today's
Panevėžys,
Lithuania) and later Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi of
Jerusalem. In
1887, at the age of 23, Kook entered his first rabbinical position as rabbi of
Zaumel, Lithuania. In
1888, his wife died, and his father-in-law convinced him to marry her cousin, Raize-Rivka, the daughter of the Aderet's twin brother. In
1895 Kook became the rabbi of Bausk (now
Bauska). Between
1901 and
1904, he published three articles which anticipate the fully-developed philosophy which he developed in the Land of Israel. During these years he wrote a number of works, most published posthumously, most notably a lengthy commentary on the Aggadot of Tractates Berakhot and Shabbat, titled 'Eyn Ayah' and a brief but powerful book on morality and spirituality, titled 'Mussar Avikhah'.
In
1904, Kook moved to Ottoman
Palestine to assume the rabbinical post in
Jaffa, which also included responsibility for the new mostly secular Zionist agricultural settlements nearby. His influence on people in different walks of life was already noticeable, as he engaged in
kiruv ("Jewish outreach"), thereby creating a greater role for
Torah and
Halakha in the life of the city and the nearby settlements.
The outbreak of the
First World War caught Kook in
Europe, and he was forced to remain in
London and
Switzerland for the remainder of the war. In 1916, he became rabbi of the Spitalfields Great Synagogue (
Machzike Hadath, "upholders of the law"), an immigrant Orthodox community located in Brick Lane,
Whitechapel. While there, he was involved in the activities which led to the
Balfour Declaration, 1917. Upon returning, he was appointed the Ashkenazi Rabbi of
Jerusalem, and soon after, as first Ashkenazi
Chief Rabbi of Palestine in 1921. Kook founded a yeshiva,
Mercaz HaRav Kook (popularly known as "
Mercaz haRav"), in
Jerusalem in
1924. He was a master of Halakha in the strictest sense, while at the same time possessing an unusual openness to new ideas. This drew many religious and nonreligious people to him, but also led to widespread misunderstanding of his ideas. He wrote prolifically on both Halakha and Jewish thought, and his books and personality continued to influence many even after his death in Jerusalem in
1935.
Kook built bridges of communication and political alliances between the various Jewish sectors, including the secular Jewish
Zionist leadership, the Religious Zionists, and more traditional non-Zionist
Orthodox Jews. He believed that the modern movement to re-establish a Jewish state in the land of Israel had profound theological significance and that the Zionists were pawns in a heavenly plan to bring about the messianic era. Per this ideology, the youthful, secular and even anti-religious
Labor Zionist pioneers
halutzim were a part of a grand divine scheme whereby the land and people of Israel were finally being redeemed from the 2,000 year exile (
galut) by all manner of Jews who sacrificed themselves for the cause of building up the physical land, as laying the groundwork for the ultimate spiritual
messianic redemption of world Jewry. He once commented that the establishment of the
Chief Rabbinate was the first step towards the re-establishment of the
Sanhedrin.
His empathy towards the anti-religious elements aroused the suspicions of his more traditionalist
haredi opponents, particularly that of the traditional rabbinical establishment that had functioned from the time of
Turkey's control of greater Palestine, whose paramount leader was Rabbi
Yosef Chaim Sonnenfeld, Kook's greatest rabbinical rival. Kook once quoted a rabbinic axiom that "one should embrace with the right hand and rebuff with the left". He remarked that he was fully capable of rejecting, but since there were enough rejecters, he was fulfilling the role of embracer. However, Kook was critical of the secularists on certain occasions when they went "too far" in desecrating the Torah, for instance, by not observing the
Sabbath or
kosher laws. Kook also opposed the secular spirit of the
Hatikvah anthem, and penned another anthem with a more religious theme entitled
haEmunah.
Kook fathered three children through his two wives: two daughters and a son, Rabbi
Zvi Yehuda Kook. His nephew was
Hillel Kook.
Legacy
Relationship with Zionism
While Rabbi Kook is exalted as one of the most important thinkers in mainstream Religious Zionism, he was close to what is now called
Hardal. Indeed, there are several prominent quotes in which Kook is quite critical of the more modern-orthodox Religious Zionists (
Mizrachi), whom he saw as naive and perhaps hypocritical in attempting to synthesize traditional Judaism with a modern and largely secular ideology.
Kook never shied away from criticizing his peers, religious and secular, as well as the increasingly cloistered traditionalists living in the Holy Land, whose way of life he characterized as being similarly affected by the negative and abnormal conditions of the Jewish exile, and therefore just as "inauthentic" as that of their Zionist counterparts. Kook was interested in outreach and cooperation between different groups and types of Jews, and saw both the good and bad in each of them. His sympathy for them as fellow Jews and desire for Jewish unity shouldn't be misinterpreted as any inherent endorsement of all their ideas. That said, Kook's willingness to engage in joint-projects (for instance, his participation in the Chief Rabbinate) with the secular Zionist leadership must be seen as differentiating him from many of his traditionalist peers. In terms of practical results, it wouldn't be incorrect to characterize Kook as being a Zionist, believing in the re-establishment of the Jewish people as a nation in their ancestral homeland. Unlike other Zionist leaders, however, Kook's motivations were purely based on Jewish law and Biblical prophecy. His sympathy towards the Zionist movement can be seen as a major stepping-stone to the Religious Zionist movement gaining momentum and legitimacy after his death.
The
Israeli
moshav Kfar Haroe, founded in
1934, was named after Kook, "Haroe" being the Hebrew acronym הרא"ה — "HaRav Avraham HaCohen". His son
Zvi Yehuda Kook, who was also his most prominent student, took over teaching duties at Merkaz Harav after his death, and dedicated his life to disseminating his father's philosophy. Kook's writings and philosophy eventually gave birth to the
Hardal Religious Zionist movement which is today led by rabbis who studied under Kook's son at Merkaz Harav.
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