The Hebrew name of Israel’s current military operation – Sha’agat Ha-ari [The Lion’s Roar] – evokes biblical phrases, but it also harks back to the titles of responsa collections from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: Sha’agat Aryeh by Rabbi Aryeh Yehuda Leib (ca. 1630-1714) and the more famous Sha’agat Aryeh by Rabbi Aryeh Leib Ginzburg (ca. 1695-1785), which was followed by a supplementary volume: She’elot U-teshuvot Sha’agat Aryeh Ha-hadashot.

Operation Sha’agat Ha-ari, which began on 28 February 2026, was not the first time an Israeli military campaign echoed the title of a responsa collection. Less than a year earlier, Iran and Israel clashed for twelve days in June 2025. The English name of that campaign was contested; President Donald Trump dubbed it the “Twelve-Day War” – invoking Israel’s miraculous victory in the 1967 Six-Day War. While the Six-Day War brought years of quiet, the Twelve-Day War brought a mere eight-month respite.

The official Hebrew name of that operation was ‘Am Ke-lavi, literally “A Lioness-like People,” but officially rendered as Operation Rising Lion. The title was taken from the biblical verse where Balaam tries to curse the Israelites but ends up blessing them: “Behold, the people shall rise like a lioness, and like a lion leap up; it shall not lie down before it will eat the prey and drink the blood of the slain” (Numbers 23:24).

The Lavi [lioness or lion] is not only a textual motif; it is also embedded in modern Israeli life and has been a popular symbol long before Operation Rising Lion. In Zur Hadassa, back in 2009, we named the local religious state primary school Lavi. Other educational institutions and initiatives also use the name: a state primary school in Na‘aleh (est. 2012), a Jerusalem educational corporation (est. 1984; name changed to Lavi in 2017), and a non-profit organisation focused on Torah education (est. 2021).

The decision to conjure the lion’s image in educational contexts may mirror our aspiration to give students the courage to make the world a better place. In Zur Hadassa, we had a further motive. At the time, Zur Hadassa was part of the Mateh Yehuda Regional Council whose symbol is a lion. We wanted to broadcast that our new school was part of the local landscape and historic culture.

The Lioness of the Galilee

Lavi is not just a name for educational ventures. In 1949, Kibbutz Lavi was founded in the Lower Galilee. While the name is not a biblical location, it is recorded in the Talmud as the site of an inn between Tiberias and Sepphoris (Palestinian Talmud, Shekalim 7:3, 50c; Berakhot 7:4, 11c). In the Crusader period, the town was known as Lubia, later called Lubya by the local Arab population. Kibbutz Lavi was founded to the northeast of the ruins of Lubya, paying homage to the region’s two-thousand-year history. In 1962, the kibbutz opened a hotel that continues to operate successfully today, thus returning the location to its role as an inn during Talmudic times.

The Lion’s Share of Responsa

This brings us to the responsa collection that carries the name of the military operation: ‘Am Ke-lavi. In 1971, the kibbutz appointed Rabbi Shlomo Aviner as its rabbi, a position he held until 1977. A kibbutz rabbi was a novelty; Aviner succeeded the first person ever to serve in such a role, Rabbi Moshe Levinger (1935-2015), who served from 1960 to 1967 and later gained fame or notoriety as a leader of the Gush Emunim settler movement.

Kibbutz life itself was a modern innovation. Religious kibbutzim like Lavi sought to navigate this new, idealistic form of community while adhering to traditional Jewish law. In 1983, Aviner collected his halakhic and philosophical writings from this period into two volumes. He titled the work ‘Am Ke-lavi, citing Rashi’s commentary on the biblical verse: “When they arise from their sleep in the morning, they get up like a lioness and like a lion to snatch the mitzvot.” The title was both a tribute to the kibbutz and a compliment to its hard-working, religiously committed members.

The first volume of Rabbi Aviner’s ‘Am Ke-lavi includes 367 sections, most of them brief responsa. These were later edited and republished in the first volume of Aviner’s collected responsa, She’ilat Shelomo (8 vols., Beit El 2001). Some of the responsa deal with broad kibbutz matters: should all members adhere to the same religious customs? How should the kibbutz give charity? How should cows be milked on Shabbat? How should cattle rustlers be stopped? Other passages address issues specific to Lavi: should the Prayer for Wayfarers be recited when travelling from the Kibbutz to Tiberias? How should the Lavi hotel deal with guests who do not keep Sabbath?

Regrettably, the metadata of these responsa has not been preserved. What we gain in immediacy, we lose in context. We do not know who asked the questions or when. Perhaps Aviner raised them himself? Was there a difference in the topics raised by men versus women? Did Aviner’s halakhic approach evolve over the time he served as kibbutz rabbi? These questions, alas, must be left unanswered.

In a particularly revealing section (§§277–280), Rabbi Aviner shared aspects of his halakhic decision-making method. These passages shed light on the entire enterprise. In a brief autobiographical note, Aviner noted:

“I find it necessary to clarify from time to time, in writing or verbally, that I am not an ‘halakhic decisor’ [posek halakhot], as I am not worthy of doing so. I only convey rulings that have been decided by the great [Torah] sages in their books when the matters are entirely explicit there. Matters that are not explicitly stated in their books, I do not rule based on reasoning and analogies – unless it is almost entirely explicit – rather, I ask genuine Torah scholars.”

A Prayer for Bibliographic Peace

Thus, Israel’s two military campaigns against Iran, ‘Am Ke-lavi – Rising Lion and Sha’agat Ha-ari – Roaring Lion, both bear names that recall responsa collections. Names for armed conflict can be doorways into the human and legal worlds preserved in responsa literature.

Yet, if the military echelons are indeed choosing campaign names by scouring the responsa literature, there may be cause for concern. In the annals of Jewish law, there are some 6,000 published volumes of responsa – more than enough for the names of future military operations.

As a people who prays and pines for peace, let us hope that this reuse of responsa titles for the names of military action remains nothing more than a bibliographic curiosity – an opportunity to reflect on Judaism’s rich legal tradition.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)