The dream team of Jewish wisdom: 3,000 years of sages take the field

Forget the World Cup final for a moment. The team taking the field in the text before you is one that passed the ball from generation to generation under fire, survived exiles, outlasted empires that collapsed and overcame crises that dismantled the great clubs of other peoples. We took the greatest figures of the generations and brought them down from the study hall to the pitch, and discovered that when you look at 3,000 years of Jewish wisdom through a manager’s eyes, the lineup almost arranges itself. So here they are: the starting 11 stars of the sages of Israel, in an attacking 4-3-3 formation, with a bench that would not embarrass Real Madrid in the Galacticos era. Goalkeeper: Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai, with a historic save A great goalkeeper is not measured over 90 routine minutes, but by one split-second decision, in a penalty shootout in the final. So it was in the final between Judea and Rome, when Jerusalem was left with only a few players and the defense had been completely breached. Everyone was certain that Judaism’s time was up. At the moment when any other goalkeeper would have thrown up his hands, Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai slipped out of the city, stood before Vespasian, Rome’s coach, and made the greatest save in the history of the Jewish people: “Give me Yavne and its sages.” Instead of clinging to a goal that had already been breached, he moved the entire match to another field. From the Temple to the study hall. From a Judaism centered around the Temple to a Judaism that builds houses of study. Thus, thanks to one spectacular save in stoppage time, the match continues to this day. Goalkeepers are measured by saves, and Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai saved an entire nation. The defense: Four who let no one through First center back — the Chatam Sofer: Rabbi Moses Sofer of Pressburg is the defender every coach dreams of: reads the game two moves ahead and does not hesitate to go in hard and aggressively when needed. When the Enlightenment and Reform movements burst into the box of European Jewry in the 19th century, he formulated the most famous defensive tactic in the history of Jewish law, words from the Mishnah that he turned into a system: “Anything new is forbidden by the Torah.” One can argue about the style, but not about the result: The communities that followed his path kept a clean sheet for generations. Second center back — the Vilna Gaon: Alongside the Chatam Sofer stands Rabbi Elijah of Vilna, a rare combination of razor-sharp intellect and iron discipline. The Gaon of Vilna did not merely block phenomena he viewed as dangerous, from the false messianism of Shabbtai Tzvi’s followers to what he identified as dangers in the young Hasidic movement. He did so with astonishing knowledge of every part of Torah, as well as grammar, mathematics and astronomy. This is an analytical defender who knows not only how to block, but also how to play the ball cleanly out from the back. Right back — Saadia Gaon: Saadia Gaon is the prototype of a fullback who also knows how to join the attack. When the Karaites threatened to dismantle the Oral Torah from within, he stopped them with a ruthless series of polemical efforts. But he did not stop there. His runs down the wing, including his translation of the Torah into Arabic, his “Book of Beliefs and Opinions,” which founded Jewish philosophy, and his work in liturgical poetry and grammar, changed the dynamics and the face of the entire game. Left back — Rabbi Judah Halevi: Judah Halevi wrote the great defensive book of Jewish thought, “The Kuzari.” The entire book is a defense of the humiliated faith against a philosopher, a Christian and a Muslim. But ask any fan: What people remember from a wingback is the crosses. Halevi’s unforgettable poetry, including “Zion, Will You Not Ask,” is one of the most precise crosses ever sent into the box. The midfield: The brain of the team Defensive midfielder — Rabbi Judah the Prince: Every great team is built around an anchor who organizes the game, and it is hard to imagine a greater act of organization than editing the Mishnah. Rabbi Judah the Prince, known simply as “Rebbi,” took hundreds of years of scattered traditions from different study halls, with conflicting versions and reports from every corner of the land, and organized them all into six meticulously structured orders. Since then, every attack in the world of Torah has started from his feet. This is a holding midfielder with the stature of a national team captain. Midfielder — Maimonides: This is a midfielder who is also the central playmaker, one who knows how to move from the center of the pitch into the box. In the first half, he is on defense with the “Mishneh Torah,” a halachic code that covers every inch of the legal field. In the second half, he is already on the attack with “The Guide for the Perplexed,” a philosophical breakthrough that dared to enter places no one ever had before him. At halftime, Rabbi Moses ben Maimon still manages to serve as court physician to the sultan, lead the Jewish community of Egypt and answer letters from Yemen. The stamina of three players, the vision of an entire generation. Attacking midfielder — Rashi: A classic No. 10. Rabbi Shlomo Yitzhaki is the player who receives the ball and distributes it in a way that makes everyone around him look better. For 1,000 years now, every player, from a 5-year-old opening the Bible to a yeshiva head diving into a sugya in Tractate Yevamot, has received from him a pass at exactly the right height, at the perfect time, in the few words required and not one more. Without Rashi there is no game: The Talmud remains locked, the Bible remains opaque. He does not score much himself, but he makes all of Israel score. The attack: Three who broke through Right wing — Hillel the Elder: A signing from the Babylonian league, who arrived without a penny and worked as a day laborer just to pay for a ticket to the study hall’s stands. A creative player credited with the curling shot known as the prosbul, a lofted ball that sailed over the payment wall and reopened the lending market. A player with a rare touch, capable of delivering a precise ball even to a convert standing on one foot, all without ever having a foul called against him, in keeping with the rule he adopted: “What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow.” And all of this at an age even older than Messi’s. Left wing — the Baal Shem Tov: Rabbi Israel Baal Shem Tov made the boldest move in the history of the game: He took the ball from the academies of the scholars and brought it down to the feet of the people. Wagon drivers, water carriers, simple Jews who knew only Psalms — suddenly, all of them were potential players on the pitch. It brought a profound change to the character of the game: prayer with fervor, joy as service of God, sparks of holiness in every material thing. Hasidism opened the game to crowds that until then had been sitting far up in the stands. Center forward — Rabbi Akiva: And finally, the striker. The story of Rabbi Akiva is the great Cinderella story of Jewish history: a shepherd who, until age 40, had not played at all on the field of Torah, and became the greatest goal scorer of the Oral Torah. He derived heaps upon heaps of laws from every crown of every letter, meaning he found scoring opportunities in places where no one else even saw an attack. He is also a leading candidate for the captain’s armband: Even when everyone else cried because they saw the game as lost and a fox emerging from the Temple, he did not break. He even laughed, because he knew that just as the defeat foretold in prophecies of doom had come true, so too would the victory that would bring the trophy. A heart-and-soul player who gave 100% until the very last moment, and whose soul departed with the word “one.” The bench and coaching staff A real team is measured by the depth of its squad. On our bench sit enormous talents. The first option off the bench is the Ben Ish Hai. Rabbi Yosef Haim of Baghdad is the player who can come on in any position on the field and look as though he has played there his entire life. Need practical halacha? There is the “Ben Ish Hai.” Need Kabbalah? He was one of the great kabbalists of his generation. Need a sermon that will fill the stands? His weekly sermons drew thousands. An electrifying player to whom the fans feel especially connected. Next to him on the bench are many other stars: Rabbi Abraham Isaac Hakohen Kook, an elite striker who sees the move three generations ahead Rabbeinu Tam, a creative midfielder who specializes in moves that are the exact opposite of what his grandfather Rashi would have done and Rabbi Nachman of Breslov — the joker who comes on in the 80th minute, when morale is on the floor, and reminds everyone that despair is forbidden and that it is a great mitzvah to be joyful. Another bench player who always brings fresh energy is Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, though he usually stays on the bench because of a red-card problem. Missing from the pitch is the holy Ari, Rabbi Isaac Luria, who worked in Safed for only two years — a career even shorter than Marco van Basten’s. In those two years, he dribbled through worlds no one knew existed. Contraction, shattering, repair: an entire kabbalistic system that transformed Jewish mysticism from a field for select individuals into the language of entire movements. And who is the coach on the touchline? Moses, the only man in history who received the tactics notebook directly from the owner, at Mount Sinai. Beside him, as assistant coach, is Ezra the Scribe, the specialist in rebuilding teams after relegation, who proved during the return to Zion that it is possible to come back from exile and rebuild the club from the foundations. Eleven players, 3,000 years and one field on which the game has not yet ended. Have any objections to the lineup? Tell us in the comments. The article is courtesy of Mashav Channel — “What Is Jewish in Israel,” which provides a platform for content connected to shared Jewish identity in Israeli society and is operated by the Tzohar Rabbinical Organization