Moses and Theodor Herzl lived thousands of years apart, but the parallels between them are hard to ignore. Both led the Jewish people out of oppression—Moses from slavery in Egypt, Herzl from the spiritual and political bondage of exile—but neither lived to see the final redemption. One died on the edge of the Promised Land. The other, decades before the State of Israel came into being. They both glimpsed the future, but were denied entry.
When Herzl presented his vision for Jewish statehood to Baron Hirsch, he said simply: “It will be a long time before we arrive in the Promised Land. It took Moses forty years.” He wasn’t being poetic. Like Moses, Herzl gave everything he had to the mission. And like Moses, he was met not just with hostility from outside forces, but with fierce resistance from his own people.
Moses was born a Hebrew but raised in Pharaoh’s palace. He never fully belonged to either world. His identity was torn between two nations. Yet when it counted, he chose his people. Herzl experienced the same split. A cultivated man of European letters, he could have remained in the comfort of Vienna. But he turned away from that life and committed himself entirely to the Jewish people. Both men walked away from prestige and stability and chose a life of suffering for the sake of the nation.
Their sacrifices didn’t stop at power or position. The Sages teach that Moses separated from his wife Tzippora in order to remain in a state of uninterrupted readiness for prophecy. While Aaron’s descendants are carefully recorded and celebrated, Moses’ family fades into the background. The Sages even identify one of his grandsons, Yonatan the son of Gershom, as a priest of idolatry in the house of Micah.
Herzl’s personal life unraveled in an even more devastating way. His marriage was hollow. His daughter Pauline died from morphine addiction. Hans, his only son—circumcised only at age fifteen—committed suicide just days later, leaving instructions that he and Pauline be buried in one coffin. Trude, the youngest, spent years in mental institutions and was murdered in Theresienstadt with her husband during the Holocaust. Herzl’s final descendant, his grandson Stephan, jumped from a bridge in the United States.
What is the meaning of this connection between Moses and Herzl? What are we meant to learn from it?
From this verse, the Sages teach that pikuach nefesh —the imperative to save a life —overrides nearly all commandments in the Bible. They interpret the words of the verse, “by the pursuit of which human beings shall live” to mean “Live by them, and not die by them.” You must violate Shabbat to save a life. You must eat on Yom Kippur if fasting puts you at risk. When life is on the line, the usual rules fall away.
And if that’s true for one human being, how much more so when an entire nation is in danger?
In Moses’ time, the people of Israel stood on the brink of spiritual and physical collapse. Moses didn’t have the luxury of living a normal life. The mission demanded everything. And the same is true of Herzl. He saw what others refused to see—that European Jewry was marching toward catastrophe. The Holocaust would soon prove him right. Had there been no Herzl, there might have been no Zionist movement strong enough to survive the Holocaust and no national rebirth after the slaughter. Herzl wore himself out trying to wake the world up. He died before his vision was fulfilled, but not before he had reignited a national flame.
This is the significance of the connection: both Moses and Herzl were called to violate the norms of ordinary religious life, not because holiness demands suffering, but because survival demands sacrifice. The usual rules were suspended. Family, comfort, reputation—all secondary. This was pikuach nefesh not just for individuals, but for the entire people of Israel.
Normally, Judaism insists on balance. The Sages valued family, community, and stability. We are not called to become martyrs. But when survival is at stake, when it’s a matter of pikuach nefesh, the equation changes. Moses and Herzl stepped outside the bounds of the ordinary because they had no choice. It was the only way to save their people.
What does this mean for us?
We aren’t expected to abandon our families. But we are expected to wake up. When the existence of Israel is threatened, when the Jewish people are targeted, when our civilization is under attack, we don’t get to be spectators. We must act.
This is true for the people of Israel, who have been fighting an existential war since October 7. And it is true for the United States, where a cultural and moral war is being waged for the soul of the nation. We no longer have the luxury of sitting on the sidelines.
There are times when staying quiet is not caution—it’s laziness or cowardice. Moses faced such a moment. Herzl faced such a moment. And we face one now.
