The test of the leader

The task of a modern Jewish leader is not so much to bring the Jewish people back to a time when they had a holy Temple and they were able to practice their national life according to rabbinic ritual, whatever that might mean. The task of a modern Jewish leader is to use the wisdom of the biblical regime as a template for the fashioning of an entirely modern national state. 

The test of the leader will be in his inventiveness. As such, the context out of which such a leader might come has to be created and formulated by a group of social designers who would specify over what sort of an administration the leader would preside. 

The covenant is not merely a static set of regulations and principles. The covenant is a dynamic relationship that engages the design and redesign of the regulations and principles from both sides of the covenantal partnership. Such was what the rabbinic regime allowed for itself. The present day Jewish people can accept no less. 

The social designers don't need to come out of the rabbinic tradition. They can come out of the tradition of secular biblical scholars. What we need to do is to marry (1) biblical scholarship to (2) political/economic and institutional design, and then bind them both to (3) moral philosophy. If some rabbis would like to join the conversation, they can sit on the sidelines but it's not important for them to contribute much to the project. 

It is not for nothing the rabbinic leadership was unable to participate in the design of the new State of Israel. They were and are intellectually bankrupt.