Rabbi Hillel Eliyahu Lieberman was born in New York in 5724 (1964), to his parents Rabbi Zevulun and Rebbetzin Bracha. At the age of twenty, Rabbi Hillel made aliyah to the Land of Israel, arriving at Elon Moreh near Shechem. There, he began studying at Joseph's Tomb in the 'Od Yosef Chai' yeshiva. In Elon Moreh, he met his wife Yael and their seven children were born there.
In all his pursuits, Rabbi Hillel remained connected to Joseph's Tomb. When he couldn't physically visit, he would gaze repeatedly from his window towards the sacred site. The Oslo Accords and the subsequent Arab terror attacks deeply shook his heart, as the Jewish presence in Shechem and Joseph's Tomb gradually weakened.
On the eve of Rosh Hashanah 5761 (2000), severe riots broke out across Israel, and Joseph's Tomb was repeatedly attacked by Arabs. All these events coalesced into a picture of desecration of God's Name that broke Rabbi Hillel's heart.
On the night of Shabbat Shuvah, 8 Tishrei 5761, the IDF abandoned Joseph's Tomb – the last Jewish foothold in Shechem – to the Arab enemy. That Shabbat, Rabbi Hillel couldn't close his eyes; he studied Torah all night and immersed in the mikveh in the morning. On his way to synagogue, he heard about the abandonment of Joseph's Tomb, and without a word, he began walking towards the place he loved.
On the path to Joseph's Tomb, local Arabs discovered and killed him. He died sanctifying God's Name. Part of his Torah teachings were published in the book 'Ahavat Ha'aretz' (Love of the Land), and the song he wrote about Shechem and Joseph's Tomb still echoes in the hills of Samaria.
Yael Lieberman, Rabbi Hillel's wife, recounted: "I have no air, my soul can no longer contain the exile," Hillel wrote many times to himself and his friends. The source of his great frustration was the dilemma between honoring his parents and settling the Land of Israel. His parents naturally wanted him to study, marry, and perhaps later make aliyah to the Land of Israel… But Hillel burned with the desire to make aliyah here and now. On the very day he completed his Bachelor’s Degree at Yeshiva University, he boarded a plane to Israel.
"Send me my diploma by mail," he told his parents. "The only certificate I want now is my new immigrant to Israel certificate…"
Every new immigrant is entitled to a taxi driver to take him from the airport to his desired destination. Hillel got into the taxi and asked himself, where should I go? Jerusalem? Hebron? Where was his place? And then he said to himself: I will do what my grandfather did: "And Abram passed through the Land to the place of Shechem, to Elon Moreh." Hillel was already familiar with the Jewish village near Shechem from when he had stayed in the country as part of an academic collaboration. More than he had studied, he had traveled the length and breadth of the Land… This is how he also reached Elon Moreh and felt a deep connection to the place.
By Divine Providence, Yael was also there at that time. "I was staying with a friend who was trying to convince me to settle in the community. Truth be told, it wasn't difficult… The landscape, our history as a people… You step out into the yard and before you are Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal. Here, wherever you look, you find the Bible."
"I lived in the village for a while, and meanwhile, I enrolled in studies. On the day I was about to leave, Hillel landed. We 'met' near the public telephone – he wanted to call home to let them know he had arrived safely, and I was expecting a call. I asked him to wait a few minutes until my call came in… This was actually our first ‘date'."
The wedding took place a few months later. "I found myself married to a tzaddik. A real tzaddik. Nothing was done carelessly, everything was with seriousness and devotion, with all his heart." For example, Yael recounts, Hillel decided he wouldn't eat produce that wasn't from Eretz Yisrael. "He told me: 'All my life I longed to make aliyah, and now that I've entered the Land, I want it to enter me.' At first, I thought it would be simple. So we'll buy only local produce. But then I discovered this meant no coffee, no tea, and many other basic products.
In our second year of marriage, we traveled to the U.S. It was the eve of Pesach, and I felt badly for Hillel's parents, as circumstances didn't allow them to come to visit us in Israel. 'Let's go to them,' I said, but Hillel naturally didn't want to leave the Land. We turned to Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu zt"l, and he ruled: Spend the holiday with your parents. Despite leaving home for the entire holiday, we prepared and cleaned it completely. Our entire trailer home was scrubbed and kosher for Pesach. I remember the taxi waiting for us outside, and then Hillel insisted on putting aluminum foil on the countertop… 'But we're not here for the holiday!' I didn't understand, but he was determined: The counter needs to be covered for the holiday. I remember sitting in the taxi, a small baby in my arms and suitcases in the trunk, and my husband quickly covering the counter with aluminum foil…
We arrived in New York. We celebrated the Seder nights together with Hillel's family, and then, at the end of the second day of the holiday, we heard there had been a terror attack in Elon Moreh. Hillel took it very hard. He cried and said, 'I must get to the funeral, but first I'm going to the Lubavitcher Rebbe to receive a blessing for the wounded.' (I know that before he made aliyah he had a private audience with the Rebbe, and he also wrote to the Rebbe before our wedding. In the middle of our chuppah, a telegram of blessing from the Rebbe arrived, and we also received a letter for the birth of every child. Hillel wrote often to the Rebbe, reporting on what was happening in Elon Moreh. After he was murdered, I found a drawer full of letters he had written to him. He also organized the printing of the Tanya in Nachalat Yosef near Shechem)." As soon as he returned from the Rebbe, Hillel announced that we were returning to Israel. "Then I understood why we had covered the counter…"
The longing for the Land, leaving it and returning to it, were central themes in the life of Rabbi Hillel, may God avenge his blood. Already at the age of five, his parents came to visit the Land of Israel, and from then on his soul was bound to the Holy Land and he dreamed of making aliyah. Even in our story, Rabbi Hillel descended from the Land for a few days, compelled to perform the mitzvah of honoring his father and mother, and immediately returned to be close to the Land and its Jews in their difficult hour (and even while abroad, he ate only food he had brought with him from the Land!).
The sages relate that Abraham, the exemplary figure in Rabbi Hillel’s life, ascended to the Land at the age of seventy, returned to Haran to his father to bring him to repentance, and then returned to the Land of Israel. During that period when he stayed in the Land, the "Covenant Between the Parts" – which appears in the Torah much later than his second ascent to the Land – took place. (It is interesting to note that according to the disciples of the Arizal, the Covenant Between the Parts took place in Shechem! From this, it appears that like Hillel, Abraham also visited Shechem, returned abroad, and immediately upon returning to the Land, traveled there).
The return to the Land, and also the appearance of the principle "there is no early and late in the Torah," are distinct phenomena of teshuvah (repentance) – teshuvah from love, the attribute of Abraham. Abraham the Hebrew returns to the past and turns it into merits. Only the first Jew can do this, because a non-Jew can only repent from now on into the future, and does not have the power to turn the past into merits – teshuvah from love.
How does one accomplish teshuvah from love? Through the power of "Lech Lecha" (Go forth, God’s directive to Abraham). A Jew is inherently a soldier, marching towards his mission without knowing where. It will lead him. It is precisely this journey into the future with complete love, without regard for what is left behind, that automatically transforms past transgressions into merits.
Even in his final journey, when he ran towards Joseph’s Tomb without considering the predatory beasts raging on the way, he walked in the ways of Abraham: Abraham came to Shechem when "the Canaanite was then in the land," disregarding the dangers that could arise from this. Unlike Rabbi Akiva, characterized by self-sacrifice of gevurah (might), Abraham did not seek to die for the sanctification of God's name in a manner of "when will it come to my hand." He simply goes, neither afraid nor thinking about self-sacrifice, and if he dies, he will accept it with joy. This is self-sacrifice of chesed (loving-kindness).
But in such self-sacrifice, there can also be a deficiency: since Abraham did not actually die, who can say that this is self-sacrifice? Perhaps it is merely disregard for danger? For this purpose, Rabbi Hillel, may God avenge his blood, emerged from Abraham. Indeed, Rabbi Hillel on his part was a completely righteous man and gave his life like the launderer who sacrificed himself at Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi's funeral. His fearless and undaunted walk on the holy Land – true holy folly – was a thorn in the side of the lowly murderers. However, this act certainly does not serve as a directive for the masses, who are commanded to act according to the established halacha: "And you shall guard your lives exceedingly."
