Parashat Re’eh 5784
by HaRav Nachman Kahana
In a previous message, I told a story about pure truth, which is often distressful and frustrating, as follows:
A man once traversed the globe in search of the hidden truths of life. It was his habit in every place he visited to ask if anyone there knew the truths of life. At his last juncture, one townsman replied that it is rumored that on the adjoining mountain lives a woman who knows the truth.
He ascended the mountain and before him stood the ugliest woman he had ever seen. Her age could have easily been 120, and any beauty which might have been hers was long ago lost. She was a pitiful sight.
He asked her if she was the woman who knew the truth? She replied that she was the personification of truth in the world. The young man could not look at her, but he was so enraptured by her wisdom and revelations on every subject, that he stayed. After several weeks, he informed her that he had to return to civilization. She agreed; and when he was just about to leave, she said, “Young man, remember to tell everyone that I am young and beautiful”.
The moral of this story is that we seek to sweeten and beautify the truth when the facts are bitter and sometimes even intolerable.
Blame
The Medina is now in the blaming stage. Who is responsible for the events of the morning of Shemini Atzeret-Simchat Torah? Where was our technologically advanced army with all its cameras and sensors along the Gaza border? During the early hours of the night, our military experts were advised as to what was transpiring near the Gaza fence; why did they decide to go back to sleep?
And the big question: When will we be able to continue our beautiful lives as they were before that fateful day?
My answer:
On that morning of Shemini Atzeret, a heavenly decree was put into motion. A decree that no human being could have delayed or halted: the devastating bloody attack by the Gaza Nazis and this ongoing war.
The relevant military officers, the head of Military Intelligence up to the Chief of Staff should be put in prison for their delinquencies. But even if they would be punished, justice would not be served. Because, in truth, almost everyone in the Medina shares part of the blame.
Meaning:
Jewish history of 3000 plus years can be likened to an accordion that produces music by intervals of expansion and contraction. The fascinating trek of Judaism from Avraham until this day is replete with periods of great devotion to HaShem through Torah and mitzvot, followed by a period of deviation from them and denial of our destiny as HaShem’s chosen people, and then back again to HaShem.
In order to protect the covenant between the Creator and Am Yisrael, HaShem surrounded us with a spiritual “electric fence” which the nation must avoid contacting. To touch it would have devastating repercussions on the manner HaShem would relate to His chosen people.
During periods of disloyalty, HaShem uses a “shocker” to prevent the nation from straying too close to the fence.
The reason for the destruction of the Second Temple and our exile from the land was to prevent national and religious suicide through the corruption of the Kohanic and political leadership.
The entire book of Devarim is Moshe Rabbeinuעs farewell address, beginning on the first day of the month of Shevat and ending on the last day of his life, the 7th of Adar – 37 days. Moshe repeats time and again the indelible warning that Jewish destiny is forever dependent on the degree of our adherence to the bond that exists between the Creator and Am Yisrael. The Shoah should be seen in this context. The assimilation of the Jews in Europe, if permitted to continue, would erase Judaism in Europe. We were about to touch the “fence” when HaShem snapped the whip.
The prophet Yechezkel expounds on this phenomenon in chapter 20, 32-37:
והעלה על רוחכם היו לא תהיה אשר אתם אמרים נהיה כגוים כמשפחות הארצות לשרת עץ ואבן
חי אני נאם א’דני יקוק אם לא ביד חזקה ובזרוע נטויה ובחמה שפוכה אמלוך עליכם
והוצאתי אתכם מן העמים וקבצתי אתכם מן הארצות אשר נפוצתם בם ביד חזקה ובזרוע נטויה ובחמה שפוכה
והעברתי אתכם תחת השבט והבאתי אתכם במסרת הברית
You (many Jews) say, we want to be like the nations, like the peoples of the world, who serve wood and stone.
(And Hashem replies) But what you have in mind will never happen.
As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, “I will reign over you with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm and with outpoured wrath.
I will bring you from the nations and gather you from the countries where you have been scattered with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm and with outpoured wrath.
HaShem will not permit us to touch the “fence”, and certainly not in His holy land. Jews who conduct themselves like goyim will bring about a swift and meaningful reaction.
This is what happened last Shemini Atzeret and the preceding Yom Kippur. On Yom Kippur, in Tel Aviv, dissident, heretical, self-hating Jews physically disrupted minyanim (prayer groups) held in public areas of the city. On the Shabbat of Shemini Atzeret (Simchat Torah in Eretz Yisrael) thousands gathered at the Nova festival near the Gaza border for fun and frolic, etc. with scenes of people singing and dancing around statues of the Budda. Around 3,000 Jews dancing through the night in a field just kilometers from Gaza, when rockets fired from the Hamas-governed enclave lit up the sky. At 6:30AM Arab Nazis burst through the border and rampaged through the festival, killing over 360 and taking more than 40 hostages from the festival, with an additional one thousand soldiers and civilians murdered in the nearby kibbutzim and towns.
As the prophet Yechezkel stated, HaShem will forcibly push you back from the deadly (fence) of detachment from the holy bond.
Unity
How long will this period of “mighty hand and an outstretched arm and with outpoured wrath” continue?
Answer: until all the people in Eretz Yisrael re-attach to the divine destiny of Am Yisrael!
The traumatic events enveloping us today have paved the way for many here to do teshuvah. But the time has come for the entire nation in the holy land to reunite as our forefathers did when standing at the foot of Mount Sinai to receive the Torah and the covenant as described by Rashi:
כאיש אחד בלב אחד
As one individual with one heart
(total unity and love of HaShem and love of fellow Jew).
May it come to pass soon.
Shabbat Shalom
Nachman Kahana
Copyright © 5784/2024 Nachman Kahana
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