The Virtue of the Later Generations

As the holy Gemara states (Gittin 88a): “Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi said: The Land of Israel was not destroyed until seven courts served idols within it.” These “courts” refer to the seven families mentioned above.

Eventually, the Beit HaMikdash was destroyed, and the Jewish people were exiled to Bavel. After seventy years of exile—under the dynasty of Nevuchadnezzar and later under the kings of Persia and Media—they merited to return to the Holy Land.

The books of Ezra and Nechemyah describe what took place during the first period of their resettlement in the Land.

In Sefer Nechemyah, chapter 9, it is recorded that the Men of the Great Assembly nullified the yetzer hara for idolatry:

“On the twenty-fourth day of this month, the children of Israel gathered with fasting, sackcloth, and earth upon them... They stood and confessed their sins and the iniquities of their fathers... Then Yeshua and Bani, Kadmiel, Shevanyah, Buni, Sherevyah, Bani, and Kenani stood upon the platform of the Levi’im, and they cried out in a loud voice to the L-rd their G-d” (Nechemyah 9:1–4).

It was through their powerful cry that they succeeded in eliminating the yetzer hara for idolatry.

After 920 years in which the yetzer hara for idolatry had been active among the Jewish people from the time they entered the Land of Israel, it was finally nullified. It disappeared!

Yet once that pull was removed, other forms of misplaced admiration began to arise.

At the beginning of the Second Beit HaMikdash, some Jews began to admire Greek culture. After the victory of the Chashmonaim, that admiration began to fade from among the Jewish people.

Much later, during the period of the Geonim, admiration for philosophy in general, and for the wisdom of Aristotle in particular, began to emerge among some Jews. This grew especially strong in the lands of Spain. With the expulsion from Spain in the year 5252, that admiration for philosophy faded from among the Jewish people.

In a later period, the Haskalah movement began in Berlin, and took root in the hearts of Jewish communities throughout the diaspora, and this impurity continues to exist until this very day.

The Virtue of the Later Generations

Approximately 150 years ago, the holy Rabbi Tzadok HaKohen of Lublin wrote the following (Divrei Sofrim, sec. 23):

Our holy Sages taught (Shabbat 112b): If the earlier generations were like angels, then we are like human beings; and if the earlier generations were like human beings, then we are like donkeys.

Precisely because of the immense greatness of those early tzaddikim, the Holy One, blessed be He, placed them in difficult tests, and they withstood them with strength.

By withstanding a test in a particular area, they weakened the power of the yetzer hara in that same area,19 thereby bringing purity to all the Jewish people until the end of all generations.

It follows that as the generations advance, the inner point of the heart becomes increasingly refined. For this reason, the heart’s inner point in the later generations is far more refined than it was in earlier generations. Although the generations decline externally, the inner point within the heart of a Jew becomes more complete and shines more brightly in each generation, until the time of the end, when it will be perfected entirely.

In those early generations, the Jewish people struggled with the yetzer hara of idolatry, immorality, and bloodshed, and the struggle was not easy.

There is no end and no measure to the tears of teshuvah, regret, confession, and pleading that flowed from the eyes of Jews throughout all those generations. Those tears were absorbed into the earth and refined it, elevating it toward the heights of supreme holiness.

Those tears, that weeping and sighing, that groaning and crying out, worked a change in the atmosphere of the world itself, making the air clearer, purer, and holier.

As the generations advanced, the world became increasingly refined. The souls rose higher and became sanctified, and the innermost essence of the Jewish soul began to blossom, preparing vessels for the redemption.

According to this, we can understand a wondrous matter: How can it be that specifically we, such lowly generations, will merit the redemption? If the holy tzaddikim of the earlier generations were not worthy of the redemption, how will we be worthy of it?

The answer20 is that although in actual deeds there is a descent from generation to generation, in the inwardness of the heart there is a gradual ascent, and it is this ascent that will ultimately bring the redemption specifically in the later generations.

In the generation of ikveta deMeshicha, we see only decline and weakness. To the eye, it appears as though sins are only increasing and becoming worse from generation to generation. But the truth is that within the inner souls of the Jewish people, there is an elevation upon elevation in every generation of exile.

The decline in action comes only because of the length of the exile, the concealment of the Divine countenance, the confusion of the mind, the terrible hardships of exile, and the fact that the Jewish people find themselves among the nations and learn from their deeds. But if the harshness of subjugation, pressure, and the confusions of exile were removed from the Jewish people, they would very quickly become worthy of lofty levels, even greater than in the period of time before the exile. For in their inwardness, the exile has added refinement and purity within the Jewish people.

Now let us return to the question we asked at the beginning of our discussion.

Wellsprings of Wisdom

19. Rabbi Nachman of Breslov teaches (Sichot HaRan, sec. 114) that it is easier for later generations to withstand certain tests, because earlier tzaddikim already weakened those kelipot through their own struggles. This is the meaning of the teaching of our Sages: “The strength of Yosef was the humility of Boaz, and the strength of Boaz was the humility of Palti ben Layish” (Sanhedrin 19b). What was a great test for an earlier generation became easier for those who came later.

20. See Ben Melech, Shemot, vol. 3, p. 268.