from the
Holy Land
from
Rabbi Ephraim Schwartz
"Your friend in Karmiel"
November 18th 2022 -Volume
12 Issue 5 24th of Cheshvan 5783
Parshat Chayei Sarah
Song of Life
It’s a uniter song. You know, one of those songs
that just gets everyone together humming, singing, dancing and many times even
holding arms together and swinging back and forth. We have a bunch of those.
There’s of course Hinei Ma Tov u’ma Naim in which the words themselves
of brothers sitting together pleasantly just makes you want to wrap your arms
around the person next to you and start swaying. There’s that Kol Ha’Olam
Kulo Gesher Tzar Me’od when we all realize that we are all in the same boat
walking down that narrow bridge, we all have trials, challenges and frightening
things that stand before us. Yet at the same time, we have faith in Hashem and
we have nothing really to fear. There’s Ani Ma’amin which fascinatingly enough
even the most secular “non-believing” Jew gets teary eyed and can’t help
himself but to long for that ultimate day when Mashiach will come. Not even a few
decades of or even a generation or two of non-observance or even tragically
ignorance of Judaism and the beauty of our heritage can still that always burning
spark of the Neshoma and the tens of generations of faith that preceded this
little gap in one’s awareness of the holiness of their Jewish soul that they
don’t even know they possess. Two or three chords of the “Ahhhh Ni Ma’aameeeen…
B’ehmuna Shlai’aimahhh” and boom! They’ve discovered their soul. By the
time the song has gotten to the high part of Vi’af al pi… she’yismamehaya
they are flying high. They are longing for their neshoma to be complete. They
want Mashiach now…
Maybe that’s why I love music so much. The old
classic songs at least. Because music speaks to our soul. It brings us
together. All of the fights, the disagreements, the politics, the different
Kipahs, dress, religious orientations, they all fall away when those uniter
songs start to play. They trigger the soul in a way that makes us realize that
we really all have one common hope and one shared destiny. We all come from
that spark of Hashem and we all want to see that day when it will be revealed
to the entire world and peace and love and brotherhood will reign. Before the
song came I on, I may not have seen that guy sitting next to me as anyone that
I have anything in common with or may even want to have anything to do with. Yet
afterwards (or at least during the song) I realize that I can’t have a world
without him.
One of those songs and perhaps the most famous
and classic one is from the king of uniter song composers Shlomo Carlebach’s Am
Yisrael Chai- Od Avinu Chai. Orthodox, Conservative, Right wing, Liberal, Reconstructionist,
Chasidim. It doesn’t make a difference. When that song starts to play it just
gets everyone to their feet. It has you cheering, waving your hands up and down
and jumping up with each chorus. With each Am Yisrael. Higher and Higher. We
are alive. Our Father is alive. It’s so popular, that it’s not yeshivish to
sing it even. Yeshivish people can’t do what everyone else are doing. Yet, Im
kol zeh… despite that… when the song comes on at some event or some
ceremony or family simcha for their non-religious cousin (Yeah I know that
yeshivish people pretend that they don’t have any of those…) They sing, they
jump, and they are united by the one thing that they realize brings us all
together. We’re alive and our Father in heaven is Alive.
You agree with me on this, I know. In fact, you’re
humming the song now to yourself. Yet, if you think about it, it’s kind of
strange. Who else in the world besides the Jewish people just sing about the
fact that they’re alive? The words aren’t about love, about happy times, about
faith, about victories and miracles, about even a better future or a nostalgic
past. I’m alive. Zehu- that’s all. Goyim don’t sing songs like that. They don’t
get excited about that. But Klal Yisrael- the eternal nation of Hashem? There’s
nothing that gets us more inspired and enthused than those 6 words. Am Yisrael
Chai, Od Avinu Chai. We exist. We’re eternal. We are children of an Eternal God
and thus possess that same never-to-be extinguished life force that He
implanted in us.
I saw an incredible insight this week from Harav
Charlap in his sefer Mei Merom in which he finds in this week’s Torah portion
of Chayei Sarah that this idea is more than just a song it is really the core
and essence of our nation. Perhaps even ironically it first finds it’s place a
parsha that talks about the death and burial of the first Jew or Jewess to be
accurate, our matriarch Sarah in a parsha that is called Chayei Sarah- the life
of Sarah.
He notes that it seems strange that Avraham
waited until Sarah died until he bought a grave for her. I mean she was no
spring chicken and the truth is Avraham being one of the wealthiest people of
his time probably had plenty of land and place with which to bury her. Ok… So
you’ll tell me that he wanted to bury her in the Cave of the Machpela.
After-all that’s where it was revealed to him that Adam and Chava were buried.
But that even strengthens the question. According to the Midrash Avraham found
out about that cave years before hand when the angels came to tell Sarah about
the impending birth of Yitzchak and he ran after a calf (or an angel that was
disguised as a calf) into the cave and saw the burial place of Adam and Chava.
So why didn’t he buy it back then? He was a good business man. He should’ve
know that they would hit him up for more money and squeeze him when his deceased
wife is lying before him. You always pay more at the last minute when you need
something. It’s why you pay more at the only gas station on the empty long
highway, why you pay more for your popcorn at the movie theater, or ice cream
at the nature parks reserve or for your tour guide when you call him a few days
before you come here 😊. Except for me, of course. I’m already booked…
So Avraham was a smart man. Why didn’t he do some advance estate planning?
The answer he tells us is because Avraham
thought that she would never die. That Sarah would be forever. That the curse
of death that had been brought to the world since the sin of Adam and Chava who
were buried there at the gateway to Gan Eden in Hevron, would finally be
rectified. U’bala Ha’Maves La’netzach- that death would finally be
swallowed up from the earth. How? Why? What do I mean? Put on your deep
thinking caps now, we’re going to get heavy.
He explains as follows. Hashem created the
world. He is eternal. Man, created in the image of Hashem with an eternal soul,
as well possesses that eternality. Hashem wishes to reveal Himself to man, but
the only way that can work is by tzimtzum- or minimalizing and hiding His
vastness. Man can’t comprehend the infinite, above space, time and physicality.
Yet Man possesses that same power and was created with the power to move beyond
this world and bring that power of heaven down to earth. In fact we are charged
to do that and deep inside our soul longs for that revalation we are meant to
bring. In fact that is really the essence of Torah. See the written word that
Hashem gave us is finite. It is limited. It is mi’tzumtzam. There’s no
adding or subtracting. It’s perfect and it’s the DNA of the physical world. The
oral law though is infinite. Every day it is expanded upon. Each Jew has
another part that he is meant to reveal in it. It is our ultimate expression of
the infinite and eternal nature of our soul revealing itself in this world. Are
you with me so far?
Now Hashem had to make man finite and remember
he’s not God, so what did Hashem do to differentiate him? And this is really
cool- by the way… He made him go to sleep. Hashem doesn’t sleep. Eternal doesn’t
stop for a second. It’s always. Man was going to be different and would sleep
to remember that he was a creation and not a Creator. It’s what it means that
the soul goes up to heaven each night when we sleep. It needs it’s daily
reminder to remember that it’s different than Hashem. You know what the word
for sleep is in Hebrew? Shaina- sleep also has the same root as the word Shina-
or shoneh- different. That’s what sleep is all about. But it seems that wasn’t
enough for us.
See, with the sin of the Tree of Knowledge when
we were tempted by the snake to eat and “become like God” we lost that simple reminder.
We needed something more impactful to remind us that we were not Gods, but
rather mere possessors of divine souls that were given to us by Him to reveal
Him in the world. So we became mortals. Death was introduced into the world. We
were given an expiration date when our souls would depart from our bodies and
we would no longer be alive. That’s not something we will ever forget and
ignore. And that effected all of mankind…except, writes Rav Charlap the Jewish
people on a national level. We are eternal.
According to the Kabbalists, when Adam and Chava
sinned every part of their body and DNA was infected and needed to be rectified
through this process. That process takes place on two levels. There is the
national level and the individual level. Each nation that came out of them will
be finite. Will rise and fall and disappear.
And each individual will as well live a life that comes to an end. It will only
be in the end of days that there will be the resurrection of the dead- Techiyas
Ha’Meisim. When we will return perfected and purified from that sin. That
process and reality changed with Avraham and Sarah. They saw and understood
that Hashem was in the world and they spent their lifetime revealing that. When
they were promised a son, Yitzchak, Avraham was shown the burial place of Adam
and Chava and according to the Zohar he told Adam that he would work to remove
the curse and shame that Adam and Chava had that they had brought death to the
world. It would be the time for the final tikkun.
Sarah worked her entire life to fix the sin of
Chava. She found the spark in Hagar and hammered her to bring it out. She
separated the kelipah of Yishmael sending him away and even getting him
to repent in that process by recognizing that it is through Yitzchak that he
and the world would reconnect with Hashem. (Fascinatingly enough- whereas Adam
sins by listening to his wife- Avraham, who is skeptical of Sarah’s decision to
send away Yishmael, is told by Hashem to listen to her. Sarah fixed Chava who
Adam shouldn’t have listened to!). The pinnacle of Sarah’s life reaches it’s
finality when she sees Yitzchak, that promised child, killed. The Satan shows
her the scene of Avraham slaughtering him. Yet although we know that Avraham
doesn’t kill Yitzchak, our sages tell us that Yitzchak’s soul left his body at
that moment and he achieved Techiyas Ha’Meisim. He was reborn. Death was
gone from the world. (It’s why the second bracha of Shemona Esrei Mechayeh
Ha’Meisim corresponds to Yitzchak). When Sarah sees this her life’s work is
complete. Chayei Sarah- the lifes of Sarah- the physical and spiritual had fulfilled
their purpose. Whereas Chava- the mother of all life had brought death to the
world Chayei Sarah had restored life to it. And thus she dies.
Yet Sarah had only restored the world to eternality
on the national level. She was the mother of Yitzchak who would father a nation
that would be eternal. That would never die or disappear. It’s why right after
her death Avraham sends Eliezer to find a spouse for him. It was time for Klal
Yisrael to come to the world and bring the entire world to Hashem. It’s why Yitzchak
is never allowed to leave Eretz Yisrael. Because Eretz Yisrael, just as the
Jewish people is always eternal. It is the Eretz Ha’Chayim. It’s where
the revelation of Hashem will shine from. It’s through us that recall that
Akeida and resurrection of Yitzchak each year on Rosh Hashana when we “King”
Hashem, that the light of that eternal day will shine to the rest of the world
and death even on an individual level will disappear and be swallowed up. Am
Yisrael Chai will reveal Od Avinu Chai. Avraham was hoping that Sarah and he would
fix that aspect of Creation as well, and he never bought that doubled cave which
Adam and Chava were buried in. It was doubled because it signifies the duality of
life and death. The temporary physical death and the eternal higher soul that will
come back to life.
But ultimately Avraham didn’t complete the job. Yishmael
still needed to be fixed, the children of Ketura needed to be sent away,
Yitzchak produces and Esau who will bring death to the world and the children
of Israel will be born outside of the land in the house of Lavan to raise the
sparks over there and bring them back to the holy land. He writes fascinatingly
enough, that Rachel who had the last of the tribes, Binyamin, and only one to
be born in Israel, if she would’ve been laid to rest in the cave of the
Machpela then the ultimate tikkun would’ve happened. But she was laid on the
side of the road to await the day when her children would return from galus and
bring Mashiach. Until the day when we achieved the job that has been waiting
from the beginning of Creation, to once again bring the entire world-all
brothers with a shared spark sheves yachad- from that narrow bridge of
galus-singing ani ma’amin with entire complete faith to once again
seeing the Avinu Chai in all of us.
That day is not far off. Hopefully it will even
be today. We are blessed to see the resurrection of our people from the ashes
of the holocaust. I am and my many tourists are astounded each day as we drive
through Eretz Yisrael and see the land that seemed dead and desolate for so
many years once again alive and singing the songs of Hashem and rebirth with
its trees, farmland and people. Torah is flourishing as never before, as each
day a new revelation, a new insight, a new Torah work is published and brings
more and more light to the world. And our nation is coming home. Am Yisrael
Chai! Od Avinu Chai… We just needed to be united together in this song and then
the world together will live forever with the light of Hashem as we were meant
to.
Have a eternal Shabbos,
Rabbi Ephraim Schwartz
************************
YIDDISH PROVERB
OF THE WEEK
“Der miesteh
leben iz besser fun shensten toit.” - The ugliest life is better than
the nicest death..
RABBI SCHWARTZ’S COOL VIDEO OF THE
WEEK
https://soundcloud.com/ephraim-schwartz/rivkah
- Chayei Sarah’s not complete without
my Rivkah Achoseinu song I composed for sister Rivky’s chasuna…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U84t9GeZ56w
– Ari
Goldwag’s latest video Ani Yehudi!
https://soundcloud.com/ephraim-schwartz/avinu-malkeinu
– Composed
in memory of my dear friend Aryeh Kupinsky and all of the Kedoshim who were
martyred including those this past week in Israel’s most recent and horrifying terror
attack. May Hashem avenge their blood…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbsK8-kptnw
- One
of the greatest Jewish love and wedding songs from Shlomi Shabbat Bereishit
Olam wih English lyrics… Love It!!
RABBI SCHWARTZ'S TOUR GUIDE EXAM
QUESTION OF THE WEEK
answer below at end of Email
16) The remains of a
structure called the “Desert Kites” were found near the settlement of _________
According to most theorists its function was
A) To show the border of an
early Bronze Settlement
B) A 17th
century gathering place for hunters to hunt partridges
C) Deer hunting in the early
bronze age
D) An open-air mosque from the early Muslim
period
RABBI SCHWARTZ'S
ERA’S AND THEIR PLACES AND PEOPLE IN ISRAEL OF THE WEEK
Achazia - 706 BC – With the death of Achav his son Achazia
takes the reigns of the Northern Kingdom of Israel. Achazia unlike
his father Achav didn’t repent. He followed in the evil ways of his
mother, Jezebel. Things
came for a head with him when he tried to continue the relationship his father
had with Yehoshafat the king of Yehudah in joint ship building venture
from Etzion Gever to Ophir. There they would ship copper and
bring gold from there. The endeavor never worked out though as the ships that
they built all got destroyed and various storms. Yehoshafat saw that as
a sign that he shouldn’t partner with the idolatrous king Achazia and so
they broke up.
Etzion Gever
according to most archeologists is by none other than the modern city of Eilat!
Many tourists come to Israel and don’t appreciate that Eilat as well was
part of Israel from the time of Solomon’s rule through the first Temple
period. Well, there you go… Ophir, though we’re not really sure where it
is. Some suggest it’s in Saudi Arabia others in North Africa. But
regardless, it’s amazing to think that the port of Eilat today was as
well used in the times of the Kings of Israel. So go visit this special city the
next time you’re here.
Achazia’s
reign doesn’t last long though after that. In fact it may not have even been a
year. The King of Moab started to fight with them. In fact we even found
records of that revolt in the Meisha manuscripts discovered in Jordan
which of course is Moab. As well Achazia falls through a lattice
roof the scripture tells us. It was a warning from Hashem to straighten up his
act. Which he didn’t. not smart. What happens to him? Stay tuned next week.
RABBI SCHWARTZ’S REALLY
(NOT JEWISH) RESURRECTION JOKES OF THE WEEK
(It’s what happens when I tour Non-
Jews during the week..sorry…)
Three Christians die together and end up in front of the gates of Heaven. The angel states to the three men "It is not widely known but in order to get into Heaven, you need to answer a simple question about religion." so, he turns to the first man and asks, "what is Easter?"
The man pauses and says, "Is that the holiday where we
gather around the table with our families, and eat turkey and pie, and
celebrate the pilgrims arriving in America?"
The angel scowls "No. That is Thanksgiving. It is not even
a religious holiday." So, he turns to the second man and asks the same
question.
The second man replies "I know this. That is the holiday we
cut down a tree and decorate it. We give gifts to loved ones. And we go to church
that day."
The angel shakes his head, "That is Christmas. It’s your
religious holiday, but you missed the whole point of that day."
Dejected, the angel turns to the last man and asks the same
question.
The last man pauses and says "Let's see if I remember this
right. Easter is the holiday we celebrate the resurrection of Yoshka after his
crucifixion by the Romans."
The angel looks impressed.
The man continues, "After his death, they took him down
from the cross, wrapped him in a shroud, and put him in a cave, then rolled a
rock in front of the entrance."
The angel turns to the other men and says, "You should have
been more like this this man while you were alive."
And then the man chimes in, "And if he comes out in 3 days
and sees his shadow there's going to be six more weeks of winter."
What’s the difference between Yoshka and a picture of Yoshka? It
only takes one nail to hang up the picture of Yoshka.
The day after Stalin's death.the Soviet nation decided to get rid
of him once and for all and bury him as far away as possible. They set up a
special commission. The commission turned to the British government with the
request that they make available a plot in a British cemetery.
“Well,” replies the British government, ”we do already
have Karl Marx in England … Two such great masters in the one cemetery . . .
That would be overdoing it a bit…”
So they tried the Germans. ”Well, we would bury him here,’
reply the Germans, ‘but Hitler is already buried here. Two such great
tyrants in the one country …”
Suddenly there arrived a telegram from Tel Aviv: ”In view of the
fact that Stalin did not block the creation of the state of Israel, we agree to
bury him here.”
”No way,”
said the members of the commission in sudden panic. ”No way. After all they
had a resurrection there …’”
Why did Yoshka move to China after his resurrection? Because it was
easter.
Yoshka and Moshe are sitting in a boat, in the middle of the Sea of
Galilee. Moshe turns to Yoshka and says, “Check out what I can do!” He
proceeds to stand up in the boat, strike his staff, and boom! The water parts
and the boat is resting on the bottom! After holding the water back for a few
seconds, he releases his hold on the water. “I bet you can’t do anything
that beats that!” Moshe states triumphantly.
So Yoshka stands up and says “Well, I think I might have
something.” He climbs on to the edge of the boat, takes a step, and falls
straight into the water.
Moshe, laughing until tears were coming from his eyes, helps Yoshka
back into the boat. “What the heck!” Yoshka says while sputtering and
coughing up water. “The last time I did that, it worked fine and I walked
straight across!”
Moshe, still laughing at the sight of Yoshka being soaked, says “Well
last time you didn’t have those holes in your hands and feet!”
A little boy, as in church on Easter Sunday with his mother, when after
all this talk of crucifixion and resurrection he started feeling sick. “Mom,”
he inquired, “can we leave now?”
“No,”
his mother replied, “the service isn’t over yet.”
“Well, I think I’m about to throw up.” the boy announced.
“Then go out of the front door and around to the back of the
church and throw up behind a bush,” said his mother.
After about 60 seconds, the boy returned to his pew, alongside his
mother.
“Did you throw up?” she asked quietly.
“Yes,” the boy answered, embarrassed.
“How could you have gone all the way to the back of the church
and returned so quickly?” Doris demanded.
“I didn’t have to go out of the church. They have a box next to
the front door that says, For the Sick.”
********************************
Answer is C -I’m pretty sure I got
this one right. I just have one question about it. See, I know what Desert
kites are. I remember them from tour guiding program of Eilat when we spent too
much time there in the heat of the day. They are basically these long stone formations
in the shape of a triangle or funnel. They were used by hunters to chase deer
into them and hunt them. They date back to the early Bronze period which is
Jews in Egypt Era and prior to that. So the 2nd part of the question
is certainly C. The question is though the question asked what Yishuv or
settlement is it near and Eilat really isn’t a settlement. But I wrote Eilat
and I believe that is the right answer as the word Yishuv could also mean town.
So I’m counting it as right. And thus the score now is until now as of last
week Schwartz 15 and 3 for MOT
(Ministry of Tourism) on this exam.
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