MOSHE ZEMER

person intended to study Torah and could find no one in Palestine to teach him, or(2) to fulfill the commandment to honor one’s father and mother."® This permission is granted only on the condition that he return to Israel , as Maimonides states:“It is forever forbidden to leave Israel for the Diaspora, except to study Torah , to marry a woman, or to effect a rescue from the Gentiles and then he must return to the Land."

The source of this halakhah is apparently the Talmudic tale of Rav Assi, who left his aged mother to come to the Land of Israel When he heard that his mother was following him, he went to R. Johanan to request permission to leave Palestine to go abroad. R. Johanan replied that it is forbidden. Assi asked,“But what if it is to meet my mother?” Johanan replied,“I don't know,” but some time later said to Assi,*‘If you are determined to go, may God bring you back in peace.” Only after Assi had left for Babylon, did he discover that his mother had died on the way to her son and that her coffin was being brought for burial in the Holy Land."

Rabbi Ovadia Yosef interprets the commentary of the Maharsha (Rabbi Samuel Eliezer Edels , 1561-1631) to this passage that one is permitted to go abroad to fulfill the mitzvah of honoring

one’s father and mother only on the express condition of returning to Israel ] 16

We thus see that over the centuries the commandment of aliyah was considered to have precedence over filial honor. This related both to going to Israel from the Diaspora or to going on JYeridah from the Land.