Comfort Breeds Cowardice: The Rabbi Who Exposed the Deadly Cost of Religious Complacency

In 1943, while millions of Jews were being murdered in Europe, Rabbi Meir Bar-Ilan stood before America’s Jewish leadership with fury in his eyes. While Jews in the Holy Land were shutting down businesses, staging massive protests, and crying out against Nazi atrocities, America’s Jews remained eerily quiet. His voice trembling with emotion, he proposed something unthinkable for comfortable American Jews: every Jewish-owned business in America, “including such shops as Macy’s, Saks and others,” should close their doors – even if only for an hour – to show solidarity with Hitler’s victims. The Jewish establishment’s stunned reluctance to take even this symbolic action revealed a devastating truth about American religious life that echoes to this day: the paralysis of comfortable people in times of crisis.

Born in 1880 as the youngest son of Rabbi Naftali Zvi Yehuda Berlin, one of Judaism’s most renowned scholars, Meir Bar-Ilan would become one of the most influential Jewish leaders of modern times. Yet his greatest legacy may be his penetrating insights into why good people often fail to act in moments of great moral urgency – insights that speak powerfully to both Jews and Christians in our own time of rising antisemitism and religious persecution.

“Those who were capable of acting, and perhaps even wished to act, were paralyzed by doubt that their efforts would bear fruit,” he wrote of American Jewish leaders, “and so they never took the first steps.” This paralysis of doubt, he argued, was not just a Jewish problem but a universal human tendency that particularly afflicts comfortable, established communities.

Bar-Ilan’s diagnosis of this spiritual malady was remarkably precise. “Young people especially suffer from this,” he observed, “believing that those who make an impact in the world possess superior abilities that they themselves lack.” This self-doubt, he argued, was especially dangerous because “success or failure often depends on external circumstances that cannot be predicted.” By waiting for perfect conditions or absolute certainty of success, people ensure their own failure through inaction.

For both Jewish and Christian readers today, Bar-Ilan’s words carry special resonance. As antisemitism surges on college campuses and in city streets and as Christians face growing hostility in many parts of the world, his call to action echoes across the decades. “The only difference,” he wrote of those who achieve great things versus those who don’t, “is that they lacked the courage to take the first step—and that lack of courage eliminated their possibility of creating something successful.”

Bar-Ilan’s critique went beyond mere observation. He saw the roots of this passivity in a spiritual failure that afflicts many religious communities: the tendency to retreat into private virtue while ignoring broader societal obligations. “The greatest Jewish disaster of our generation,” he wrote, “is that Jews no longer feel responsible for the entire people of Israel… while our leaders think only about their communities, political parties and ideologies.”

This spiritual myopia particularly frustrated him when it came from religious leaders. While some justified their passivity as humility – “Who am I to tackle such great challenges?” – Bar-Ilan saw it differently. “It’s possible that this attitude derives from humility,” he acknowledged, “but if you see a whole generation of humble people, it is a sign that there is no greatness at all… Even God weeps in the hidden places for the lost pride of Israel.”

His solution was radical for a religious leader: “To make a difference for the people of Israel, a person must be a little bit of a Ba’al Ga’ava (he must have a little bit of arrogance!).” This call for holy chutzpah – the courage to act boldly in times of crisis – represents a profound theological insight that speaks to both Jewish and Christian traditions.

Bar-Ilan’s own life exemplified this philosophy of active faith. When he arrived in America in 1913, he found scattered local Jewish groups with little national organization or influence. Rather than accepting this status quo, he built a powerful network of over 2,000 local chapters that would play a crucial role in supporting the establishment of Israel and its early development.

For contemporary readers, Bar-Ilan’s message carries special urgency. When he criticized American Jews in 1943 for their inadequate response to the Holocaust, he was highlighting a pattern that repeats throughout history: the tendency of comfortable religious communities to respond too late to gathering storms.

“If Orthodox Jews in America would constantly feel a responsibility for the broader state of Judaism,” he wrote, “and did not want so badly that their work be done by others, Judaism in America would look much stronger than it does.” This insight applies equally to all faith communities today – the tendency to expect others to fight our battles while we maintain our comfortable routines.

Perhaps most powerfully, Bar-Ilan understood that the greatest threat to religious communities comes not from external opposition but from internal apathy. Like Alexis de Tocqueville, who warned that democratic complacency could weaken America, Bar-Ilan saw how this same passivity could undermine religious life – a concern that remains pressing today.

His message for our time is clear: what religious communities need most is not extraordinary brilliance or talent, but iron determination, courage, and self-confidence. As both Jews and Christians face mounting challenges to religious freedom and traditional values, Bar-Ilan’s call to action rings truer than ever.

For Jewish readers, his words carry special weight in the aftermath of October 7th, as Israel fights for survival and antisemitism surges worldwide. For Christians, his insights speak to the challenge of maintaining active faith in an increasingly secular society. For both communities, his core message remains vital: faith without action is incomplete.

In the end, Rabbi Meir Bar-Ilan’s legacy is not just his institutional achievements or scholarly works, but his prophetic understanding of human nature and religious obligation. His warning about the dangers of passivity, and his call for holy boldness in times of crisis, speak directly to our moment in history.

As religious communities face new challenges in the 21st century, Bar-Ilan’s voice calls us to shake off complacency and embrace active faith. The question is not whether we have the ability to make a difference – it’s whether we have the courage to take the first step. As Bar-Ilan might say today: The time for hesitation has passed. Now is the time for action.