5 Thirty Day Limit
A visit to the Holy Land as a means of strengthening Yiddishkeit and family life at home; limiting the stay to fewer than thirty days
I am in receipt of your letter and I was pleased to note that there has been an improvement in your life, as well as an improvement in your relationship with your husband. Inasmuch as the Torah lays considerable emphasis on the proper relationship between a husband and wife, it is well to remember that the directives of the Torah are also a delegation of power from On High enabling one to carry them out. I trust that the improvement will gain in substance and, of course, every effort in this direction on your part, as well as on the part of your husband, will give added momentum to it.
In regard to your question about visiting Eretz Yisrael, our Holy Land – it is self-evident that such a trip has to be connected with a matter of Kedusha. In other words, that it will bring an additional measure of adherence to the Torah and Mitzvoth in the daily life, both in you, personally, and through you – as akeret habayit and mother, to the whole family. If you think that this will be so, your trip is indeed worthwhile, provided of course that it is with your husband’s consent, and also that it will not interfere with the chinuch of the children.
If you make such a visit, it would be well to arrange that your stay in Eretz Yisrael should be less than thirty days.⁴ In a case where the trip is made with a group, and it is planned for more than thirty days, it would be well if, before the thirty days are over, you make a trip to some point in Eretz Yisrael which does not have the same kedusha as Eretz Yisrael proper, to Eilat, for example, or similar places.
May G-d lead you in the way that is truly good for you in all the matters about which you write in this as well as in your previous correspondence, and grant that you should have good news to report soon and always.
Published: The Letter & The Spirit, vol. 1, p. 262 Note: Letters printed in The Letter and the Spirit are drawn from the archives of Rabbi Nissan Mindel, the Rebbe’s secretary who was entrusted with transcribing the Rebbe’s orally dictated letters. The archive includes secretarial copies, some of which may not contain the Rebbe’s final edits, as well as drafts and unsent letters.
⁴ Staying in Eretz Yisrael for more than 30 days can raise halachic questions regarding one’s return to the Diaspora. Explore More: See also Igros Kodesh, vol. 18, letter 6887; Likkut Maanos Kodesh 5728, no. 189; Likkut Maanos Kodesh, Miluim, vol. 3, p. 161.
