A Jew in New York: Faithful – or an Idolater?

For thousands of years, Jews have lived outside the land of Israel. They prayed, observed Shabbat, and followed the commandments faithfully, often under extremely difficult circumstances. But instead of praising them, the Sages say something shocking: a Jew living outside Israel, even one who is devout and righteous, is akin to an idol worshipper: 

“Anyone who lives in the land of Israel is likened to someone who has a God, while anyone who lives outside the land is likened to someone who has no God; as it says, ‘I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Canaan, to be your God’ (Leviticus 25:38). This is not to be taken literally – that one who does not live in Israel has no God – but rather to say: anyone who lives outside the land is as if he worships idols.” 

How can this be? How can a Jew in New York or London who meticulously keeps the Torah’s commandments  and lives a devout life be compared to one who worships idols? How could the Sages – many of whom themselves lived outside Israel – condemn Jews across the generations so sharply?

Ambassador Yechiel Leiter, Israel’s ambassador to the United States and a Bible scholar, explains this using another teaching from the Sages:

“Even though I will exile you from the land to foreign lands, still, you must remain marked by My commandments (mitzvot). That way, when you return, they will not feel new to you. This may be compared to a king of flesh and blood who grew angry with his wife and sent her back to her father’s house. He said to her: Continue to adorn yourself with your jewelry, so that when you return it will not be unfamiliar to you. So too, the Holy One, Blessed be He, said to Israel: ‘My children, remain distinguished through the mitzvot, so that when you come back to the land, they will not feel like something entirely new.’”

A Jew living outside the Promised Land may fulfill every commandment faithfully, yet his fulfillment of the Bible is fundamentally different from that of a Jew living in Israel. In Israel, each mitzvah is performed within the context God intended. Every act—whether giving charity, eating matza on Passover, or lighting the Shabbat candles—fully “counts” because it takes place in the land. Outside Israel, mitzvot are considered preparatory or practice, ways to remember and maintain the commandments until a return to the land. Observance in exile remains necessary, but it exists on a lower level, lacking the full force of God’s command.

The Sages distinguish between a mitzvah that is commanded and a mitzvah that is performed voluntarily. “Greater is the one who is commanded and fulfills than one who is not commanded and fulfills.”

When a mitzvah is commanded by God, its source is His will, and the person fulfilling it is responding directly to God. The act is not the person’s own choice; it is obedience to a divine decree. This is true service of God, for we are fulfilling His will and not our own. In contrast, a mitzvah performed voluntarily is done by the individual out of his own initiative. Even if the person acts with full devotion and care, the act is ultimately shaped by human choice, not by the immediate will of God. 

This distinction is critical: one fulfills the command because God commands it, while the other fulfills it because he chooses to. The former is direct service of God; the latter, while sincere, carries the risk of serving the self rather than God.

This distinction between commanded and voluntary observance helps explain why the Sages speak so sharply about Jews living outside the land. Because mitzvot outside the land are performed voluntarily, on the individual’s terms rather than as an immediate response to God’s command, they do not qualify as true service of God. In other words, if a Jew truly wants to fulfill God’s will, he would move to Israel and fulfill the commandments there, as God commanded him to.

Rabbi Yishmael, a first-century Jewish teacher, taught: “Jews who are outside of the land are considered as if they serve idolatry in purity.” This does not mean they worship idols. It means that while their observance is sincere, it is flawed because they are doing so on their own terms, outside of the Holy Land. Their worship is “pure” because they are, after all, keeping the commandments; but it is tinged with idolatry because it is done on their own terms rather than God’s.

During the Jewish people’s two thousand years of exile, there were long stretches of history when it was simply impossible for most people to move to the land of Israel. The land was controlled by hostile foreign powers, wracked by wars and plagues, and the journey itself was dangerous and uncertain. Moving to Israel under such circumstances literally meant risking your life and the lives of your loved one. Given the deadly risks, I do not believe the Sages were condemning Jews who yearned to live in the Holy Land but simply could not get there. 

Today, the situation is radically different. The Jewish people are once again sovereign in their own land. A flight from New York to Tel Aviv takes less than ten hours. Israel’s economy is strong, offering opportunity in nearly every field. Despite real security challenges, life in Israel is vibrant and thriving. Yet millions of Jews still choose to remain in the diaspora. If the Sages condemned anyone, it was not those trapped by history’s harsh circumstances, but the Jews of today who refuse to fulfill God’s Torah where He intended it to be lived – in the Holy Land.

As a Jew who spent the first forty years of my life in exile, I am not in a position to lecture American Jews, or others living across the world. Uprooting one’s life, leaving behind family, community, and comfort to start anew across the ocean is never easy. But difficulty does not erase God’s will. His first command to Abraham was clear and uncompromising:

The land of Israel is not a symbol or an abstract ideal. It is the foundation of Israel’s mission, the ground on which God expects His people to fulfill His word.

To truly fulfill God’s commandments and build a society rooted in holiness, the people of Israel must live in the land of Israel. Exile can preserve the mitzvot, but it can never bring them to completion. Outside the land, observance is filtered through human choice; in the land, it forms the foundation of a holy society as God intended. Only in this way can Israel fulfill its calling to be a light unto the nations.

May God grant His people the clarity and courage to return to the land He commanded, to serve Him fully, on His terms, and to fulfill the destiny He set for Israel from the very beginning.