from the
Holy Land
from
Rabbi Ephraim Schwartz
"Your friend in Karmiel"
March 13th 2026 -Volume 16 Issue 21 25th of Adar 5786
Parshat Vayakhel-Pikudei/ Ha'Chodesh
The Sound of Sirens
I apologize in advance if the E-mail is incoherent this week. Waking up and running to a bomb shelter every few hours because ballistic missiles might be falling on your head and destroying your house and killing your family isn't a situation that generally lends itself to the communication of well-thought-out deep insights. My brain is frazzled and I don't even have a handful or more of children in the house without school driving me nuts. It's just Aliza. Although, a frazzled anxiety ridden wife can be a handful as well. Almost as much as a couch stranded, tourist-less husband without sleep can be. Yeah, I don't even think the word is incoherent even. I think incomprehensible is the better word. But as I said, my brain is too frazzled to think much these days. Welkam to Eezrael 2026. Part III or IV of the Gaza/ Hezbollah, Iran/ Mashiach wars Movie series.
So yes, this latest phase of the war has brought things to a new level of insanity. It's like just when you thought things were getting quiet. Boom! Hello. Freddy is baaack. This time with ballistic sirens. With really huge scary missiles. Not those little baby katyushas that were until now. Wasn't Hezbollah done with already? Didn’t we beeper them? Didn't we destroy Iran's nuclear threat. It's like Hashem keeps telling us, tatteleh… "It ain't over until it's over". Or until the Fat Kohen sings in the Beit Ha'Mikdash. I hate those sirens so much. They're so jarring. Which is kind of the point. I get it. It sends a shiver down your spine. You look back at your house as you make your way to the miklat/shelter and like Lot's wife you take one look back and wonder if it will still be there. I always take my favorite coffee cup with me. I like that cup. It's hard to find a cup that keeps my coffee warm, the way I like it. We've been through a lot together. And then as I continue to make my way to that shelter in those thirty or so seconds we have- at least when it's from Lebanon, Iran gives us a bit more time.- I turn around and make sure Aliza's on her way too. After-all what good is a coffee cup if there's no one to make the coffee.
You know what I was thinking last time I was in the bunker? That if Mashiach finally decided to get his donkey over here already and blow that shofar that would ring out to the world, do you know what everyone would do? They'd probably run to the bunker with their coffee cups. Hey, how are we supposed to know? They sound the same. Woooo oooohh woooo oooohww woooo ooooohhhww. Tekiah. Shevarim. Tekiah. Isn't it crazy that we're living in a time when the shofar blasts of these sirens are coming day in and out. That the yovel has come to the land. Which the Talmud tells us is a yababah- a continuous blast that is heralding in freedom to the land and the world. That's the only sound we hear again and again and again. The alert I get on my phone that jostles me even sounds like that word. yababa yababa yababa…
Uru yisheinim mi'shinaschem- Awaken sleeping ones from your slumber- is not a spiritual homiletic interpretation of the lives we are living. It's the reality. And it's non-stop. At 12:00 AM. At 2:00 AM. At 4:00 AM. But that last one was just a warning that we might have to go to the shelter. So don't sleep too comfortably. Nice of them to tell us that. As if we were going to any ways…
So, I've got sirens on my head. Literally. I'm hearing shofars. I'm waiting for Mashiach. For this to be over already. So to get away from this all, I take a peek at the parsha. What do you know? We've got sirens there too. I can't get away from this thing. There's no where to hide. There ain't no mountain high enough…Ain't no valley low enough… Ain't no river wide enough…To keep me from getting to you. I told you. I'm losing it. So where are the sirens in this week's parsha? Get ready. IN THE NEXT FEW MINUTES THERE WILL BE A MESSAGE AND AN ALERT COMING YOUR WAY. PREPARE TO MAKE YOUR WAY TO A PROTECTED AREA WHERE YOU CAN BE SAFE AND NOT BE INSPIRED. I told you. I'm losing it…
This week's parsha concludes the book of Shemos. It's a double whammy. That's like one siren after another with the last two parshas of Vayakhel and Pikudei being read and in fact the longest Torah reading of the year. Isn't it appropriate that the longest reading should be the ones right before we finish the Book of Redemption. A book that it seems has a hard time getting to the end and concluding. Oh and in case two parshas isn't enough for you, Our Rabbis threw in one more, it's parshat Ha'Chodesh this week as well, when we read the last of the four supplemental readings of the mitzva of the New month of Nissan and the mitzva of Kiddush Ha'Chodesh and of course the laws of the Pesach sacrifice the upcoming holiday of our Redemption, for real this time.
The parsha and book concludes, not with the Jewish people coming into the land. Not with us being safe from our enemies. Not from us establishing a Jewish national democratic homeland where all religions can practice their faiths freely. Not with Shwarma and falafel stores, apple orchards and wheat fields and not even with Kollels, yeshivos and places to study Torah all day long. The Sefer Ha'Geula- the Book of Redemption didn't even end with the revelation of Hashem on a mountain where we stood together united finally, for a few minutes at least, as one man with one heart. That's not the end of the story. It's not about getting the Torah that we can learn all day.
The end of the Book, the conclusion of the redemption, ends with hammers and nails and the construction project of Eternity. It's building the home for Hashem amongst us. Within us. It's returning to the Garden of Eden life, where Hashem is walking with us in the garden. All the time. Listen to the last words of the Seforno on this Book.
Shemos (40:37) And when the Clouds (of Glory) went up from the Tabernacle the Children of Israel traveled- and so much was the Shechina permanent in the Mishkan, that it didn't move from there until the Bnai Yisrael needed to travel. This didn't happen in Shilo and neither in the First or Second Temple. But it will be even greater than this in the Third Temple, may it be established and built speedily in our times. As it says in Zecharia (2:9) and I will be there, says Hashem, a wall of fire surrounding you and with honor I will be within it
That's the end of the story. That's what these sirens are all about. Why do I say sirens? Because as I said, the prelude to this is sirens around the land, but a different type of siren. One that you may miss if you're sleeping. If you're not tied in. But who's sleeping these days?
See in Parshat Vayakhel, right after all of the description of the donations and work that was being done for the Mishkan is elaborated and reiterated once again, the Torah tells us that the construction people came to Moshe that the people have brought too much. They don't stop. They keep coming and coming. Dai Kvar. It's enough. So what does Moshe do?
Ibid (36:6-7) Va'yaviru Kol ba'Machaneh- he passes the sound through the camp.
Wooooo ooooohwww wooooh ooooohhh. He turns on the sirens. He sounds out alerts.
"Each man and woman should not do anymore work for the donations of the Kodesh."
Sirens mean stop work. No more tourists. No more holy work. The job is done. And it was.
Va'yikaleh ha'am mei'havi- The people stopped bringing and the work was enough and even more.
Do you know what the sign of the Geula is? It's the siren telling us that we've done enough. We can stop doing. We don't need more tzedaka. We don't need more merits. We don't need more Torah. More Yeshivos. More achdus. We just need to sit and bask in the glory of Hashem. The work is done. Stop trying to fix and to donate. It's Shabbos. Va'Yichulu Hashamayim Vi'Haretz- the heavens and earth were finished on that 7th day of Creation. It's the same word as
Va'Yichalei Ha'am li'havi- the nation stopped bringing. They were concluded. We've come full circle. Hashem created the world in 6 days and on Shabbos He rested. We now have left Egypt. We've built Him his home and now it's time to rest. To sit in His light. To dwell with Him and Him with us. The clouds have come down. And as Rashi tells us it was a sign that the sins of the past, of the Eigel, of the false idols, of our exile, of Egypt and everywhere else has been forgiven. Shabbos is here. The Redemption has concluded. Listen to the sirens.
The Talmud in Shabbos and the Midrash learn out a rather strange law from this verse. It tells us that hidden in this command not bring anymore is the law and prohibition of hotza'ah on Shabbos or what we like to call "carrying". Moshe was telling them that Shabbos is coming and they shouldn't carry any more. See, without this verse we wouldn't know that "carrying" from one domain to another is called a "melacha"- a prohibited work on Shabbos. But since it says that they "stopped carrying and the melacha was enough"- we derive that carrying is also considered a prohibited creative act on Shabbos.
Now although this verse on the simple level doesn't seem to be talking about not carrying on Shabbos, the Talmud notes, but rather for them to stop because the work was done and it was too much already. Yet, fascinatingly and of course never coincidentally enough, we learn out from the verse by Yom Kippur, where it also says that word of passing a shofar sound throughout the land. And just as there where it tells us to blow the Shofar it's talking about on a day that it's prohibited to do work, Yom Kippur, over here as well it is a reference to stopping from carrying on a day that is prohibited, Shabbos. Yet, now if you think about it, is where it becomes cool and today.
For the Shofar blast over there on Yom Kippur, the siren, is talking about the Yovel year. The year that heralds in the redemption. That freedom is cried throughout the land. That all slaves go free. That we have been forgiven. That there is nothing left that we have to do. It's why we blow the shofar each Yom Kippur at the end of the day. After ne'ila that one moment that we taste Gan Eden. When we are alone locked/na'ul together with Hashem. That's the siren sound. That's where we derive on Shabbos that we are prohibited to carry. To move anymore from one reshus to another domain. On Shabbos we have to understand that our work is over. We're there. We're redeemed. Everything that needed to be done for the Shechina to rest with us is ready. We just need to sit down at the Shabbos table. We need to rest. We need to be present. We need to stop trying to move. To carry. To change. To fix. We need to just put away our phone and be One with the clouds of Glory that are around us.
Do you know what the ultimate teshuva and perhaps the hardest and final teshuva that we need to do is? It's not to change. It's not to fix. It's not to bang on our chest. It's not to make new resolutions. It's not to give more tzedaka, charity, learn more Torah, burn more sheitels or phones, add new takanos. It's about stopping and finding Hashem within us. It's returning to our core. To our essence. It's not about saying I'm not good. I have to change. It's about seeing how holy and good you are. How much Hashem is already there within you? How the clouds of Glory are hugging and protecting you. Stop moving. He's here. Get up from your slumber and see what's in front of you. Open your eyes.
It's not dreaming about a better place or world or better you. About returning to Eretz Yisrael about living a perfect life. About doing things and bringing things to build the Bais HaMikdash. Everything is here already. You just need to put the pieces together. Hashem loves us. His Shechina and His hand is showing itself like it has never before. In a wall of fire. Greater than even in the wilderness, in the Mishkan in Shilo, in the first or second Temple as the Seforno says. Tens of thousands of ballistic missiles falling and almost nothing is happening. We just keep running to a miklat and back again and again. Because we don't see the geula. We don't hear the shofar's siren telling us to stop moving from place to place. Just come home. The work we've done. The 2000 years of Exile that we labored, that we died, that we sacrificed, that we were martyred, that we prayed and longed for to finally be over is complete. V'hoseir- It's more than complete. So why are you still moving. Why aren't you freeing your inner slave. Why do you still feel you need to carry from one place to another. You're in the camp of the Shechina. You're home. Put away the phone and sit at the table.
Our Rabbis tell us that hotza'a is a melacha geru'a- it's an inferior melacha. Everything else that we did for the Mishkan is part of a creative process. It's building, fixing, creating, making something new. Hotza'a- carrying isn't really doing anything. It's just moving from place to place. Do you know why it's a melacha geru'ah? Because as opposed to everything else that creates something. When I move something from place to place. When I carry something from one place to another. I'm saying that I'm not really where I need to be. That this isn't where it needs to be. That the Shechina won't work and happen unless I change. It's constant movement. It's not about what I do with the things that Hashem has created. It's about moving myself from place to place. It's about not being at rest. The limud of that prohibition is from the siren. It tells us to stop moving. To sit back and watch the yeshuah. See it unfold. Realize that where you are is exactly where Hashem wants you to be. He put you there. He's there with you. His Shechina can rest with you even there. Find that. Connect with that. And then you will be redeemed. Then you will break those bonds of slavery that hold you back from celebrating with Him. And freedom will ring throughout the land.
There is another time in our history when a kol was sent out throughout the land. When a siren was rung. When we were awakened and when everything changed. When the Navi tells us we stopped and then we were redeemed. And guess what? It was on the 1st of Nissan. It was Shabbos Parshat Ha'Chodesh. The book of Ezra tells us how Ezra returns with the exiles and begins to continue the rebuilding of the second Temple. The process begins with them leaving Bavel and heading to Persia to Iran. On the first of Nissan. Shabbat Parshat Ha'Chodesh.
Ezra 7:9 For on the first month (Nissan) Yesud Ha'Maala- it was the aliya from Bavel was established and they arrived in Jerusalem by the goodness of the hand of Hashem upon them on the fifth month (Av).
There in Yerushalayim they brought sacrifices. The Navi gives a whole accounting in same way that it does in our parsha of all of the gifts that they brought. There, word gets to Ezra that the people are married to non-jews. They're off the derech. They're sinners. They haven't done teshuva. Isn't that amazing. Mind-blowing. How can it be, that the we've returned to Israel and even begun sacrificing when most Jews are still in galus and when the ones in Israel are still intermarried. So then Tishrei comes. Rosh Hashana and then Sukkos and right before Chanuka on the 20th of Kislev Ezra calls everyone together. He presses on the siren. He sends out a call. and tells them it's time to leave their wives. To give thanks to Hashem. To find their inner selves. To return.
Ibid (10:7) Va'yaviru kol bi'yehuda vi'yerushalayim – and he sent out a kol, to all of Yehuda and Yerushalayim to gather in all the exiles to Jerusalem.
The sirens went out. The nation gathered. The people are nervous but a servant named Shechanaya ben Yechiel takes charge and tells them in incredible words.
Ibid (10:2-2)We have rebelled against Hashem. We have taken foreign wives from the nations of the land. Yet now we have a Mikva/ a hope, that can purify us from this. And now we will make a covenant with Hashem our God to remove all of the women and children born of them with the plan of Hashem. And the Chariedim of the mitzvos of Hashem and His Torah will fulfill this.
Not in one day. The people say that the "melacha" is too great. But the process begins. There is Hatikva. There is hope. The Chareidim will work with us. They will help us get to where we need to get to. We're all culpable. We're all one.
Did you get that person's name? Shechanya- Hashem dwells. Shechina. The son of Yechi-El. Hashem lives. Am Yisrael Chai. It comes together and the comes Nissan. Shabbos Parshat Ha'Chodesh. The parsha of renewal. The parsha that we fade like the moon into the darkness but we come back. And then the work is concluded.
Ibid (10:17) Vayichalu Ba'kol anashim ha' hoshivu es ha'nashim nochriyos ad yom echad la'chodesh ha'rishon- and the men concluded returning the foreign wives by the first of the the first month. Nissan. By this Shabbos. They concluded. It was Va'Yichulu. The work was done. The Mikdash could finally be rebuilt. The sirens stopped. The Geula had arrived.
The moon doesn't have to do anything to arise. It just has to reveal itself. When it is darkest it shines brightest. It's when its true light shows itself. It's when it best reflects the sun that it draws its' light from. That is the month of Nissan. That is where we find ourselves today. The teshuva then came after we realized who we are and how much we are loved by Hashem. When we found that inner spark and light. It wasn't by changing and it wasn't by doing things differently. It was by listening to that siren. It was by hearing that sound and shofar from Sinai resonating still within ourselves. It's by being in the land where that siren and call is happening. After that we just naturally returned. We left all the foreign influences behind. We stepped into the Mikva into the hope and we walked out cleansed. Pure. One.
It's been a long time since that return of Ezra that could’ve been the final return had everyone come back. Had they had faith in the intermarried secular Jews in Israel returning and doing teshuva in one minute. Had they seen the spark and understood that our mission was only about building the Bais Ha'Mikdash. Nothing else is a redemption. Nothing is else is important. But this time around, No one will be left behind. There is no fourth Bais Ha'Mikdash. The siren is ringing. It's time to stop and answer it's call. The geula is here. Will every one please take shelter in your protected space. In the shade and shadow of Hashem. It doesn't get more coherent than that…
Have a quiet and renewing redemptive Shabbos,
Rabbi Ephraim Schwartz
************************
YIDDISH PROVERB OF THE WEEK
" Dos lebn iz nit mer vi a Cholem, ober vekt mikh nit oif!- Life is nothing but a dream, but don’t wake me up!
RABBI SCHWARTZ'S COOL VIDEO OF THE WEEK
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2BwMTfn68k – Yeedle and Ben Ezra beautiful Mimakim new drop… beautiful
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGJ7QaHZYUQ - LKavod Shabbos. Eitan Katz Eishes Chayil Chupa…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0cXWexP6tU&list=OLAK5uy_npIgRt6QGiKy3EEI-Q8NJY3yr11HsTbvU - Abie Rotenberg's Son and album? What do you think? War on gravity…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvUNXWRjpWE&list=RDnvUNXWRjpWE&start_radio=1 – I think I'm the only shul in the world that uses this tune every Shabbos in Shul… Abie's vi'shamru
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DzLeBVvKw8g&list=RDDzLeBVvKw8g&start_radio=1 – and here's Carlebachs Vshamru- the classic one!
RABBI SCHWARTZ'S TOUR GUIDE EXAM QUESTION OF THE WEEK
answer below at end of Email
24. From the end of the 19th century until the beginning of the 21st century, the railway route
from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv passed through Nahal /Wadi
________________
In which of the following agreements was the route of the "Green Line" determined?
A. Rhodes 1949 Armistice Agreements
B. Oslo Accord
C. Camp David Accord
D. Sykes–Picot Agreement
RABBI SCHWARTZ'S ERA’S AND THEIR PLACES AND PEOPLE IN ISRAEL OF THE WEEK
The mysterious tomb of Daniel- 368 BC- With Daniel's last prophecy and vision of the end of Days and everything we're experiencing we don't hear from him anymore. Where is he buried. Shouldn't we go daven by his grave. This is his era. This is what he foresaw. Where is he?
So the oldest and first tradition we have from him is from Binyamin of Tudela the famous 12th century traveler. He tells that he found the tomb of Daniel in Shushan. In Persia. In Iran. And he tells us a fascinating story and custom about his tomb.
It seems that his grave was originally on one side of a city in Persia by a shul and that side became very wealthy. Of course attributing it to the tomb of the prophet. Well the poor people on the other end of town weren't that happy about it. So they protested and a compromise was reached where every year the tomb and coffin was dug up and moved to the other side of the city, until they eventually both became rich. This lasted until the Shah Sinjar came, whom he says was a ruler over 45 other kings and ruled from one end of the Middle East to the other. Although his reign was only 4 months and 4 days. Which is a lot longer then the last few who didn't even make it 4 days… 😊 . Well, he didn't like this whole moving the coffin thing and he had him buried by a bridge in the middle of the two sides of towns. There it was established as a place of prayer for all religions. It stayed there until the year 683 when it was brought to Shushan where Binyamin found it buried.
Another tradition by the Seder Hadoros says he was buried in the Chidekel/ Tigris river like the bones of Yosef in the Nile. Now I don't know if we can get to the Chidekel, yet if he's in Iran… who knows? Maybe soon we'll start seeing pilgrimages there once again…
RABBI SCHWARTZ’S TERRIBLE IRAN WAR JOKES OF THE WEEK
Being an Israeli means to get annoyed that you received an alert in which was never followed up by a siren about a ballistic missile that was on its way to kill you.
I just turned off the news and put on a serial killer documentary to relax.
A missile fell in Bnai Brak in an open area. The Mayor is wondering where there is still an open area in the city. The heads of all the local organizations are as well on their way to find city budgets to develop it.
What do you call a pig with lights and sirens on it's back? Hambulance.
A missile fell in Tiverya the city planners said to leave it there. It fits in with all of the other potholes in city.
A missile lands in Tiverya and takes one look and turns around and says "it looks like you did the work here already without me.
2026 the year when women in pants dropped bombs on men in dresses
IRC General- Should we blow up the Nuclear Reactor in Iran?
Ayatolla's heir- Not painful enough. Let's shut down school during Pesach cleaning.
Iran warns Israel it has huge stockpile of cardboard Supreme leaders.
Today is the tenth day which is one week and three days in the counting of Chol Hamoed Purim.
Do not believe the News. The United States and Israel di not bomb Iran. It was mostly a peaceful protest against their Nuclear weapons facilities.
Homeland Security has ordered a return to normal schedules conditionally. Parents can decided all children that don't help with Pesach cleaning have to return to school tomorrow.
At the rate my family is eating here over the past few days. There won't be anything left to sell for Pesach.
Home Front Command/ Pikud Ha'oref clarifies that a refrigerator is not a safe secure shelter. There's no need to go into it every ten minutes.
Fun Fact: There have been no flights to Iran for 46 years. For over a week no all flights from Israel have only been to Iran. Talk about making up for lost time…
Our Purim food is almost used up. Now what will we eat in the mamad
Iran: Our missile accuracy is almost 100% 95 percent of our missiles have made direct hits with Israeli rocket launchers.
Israel remains the only country in the world that knows exactly when a missile will fall, but can't tell you when the next bus is meant to arrive.
*******************************
The answer to this week's question is A– There goes the streak. I had no clue what nachal it ran through. I guessed Ayalon even though I knew that it was probably not right. As it's on the way and he new trainline passes through there. But the correct answer was Sorek or Refaim. On the other hand part II I go right just byh a good guess. I knew it wasn't Olso or Camp David Accords. And I knew it was 1949 lines. I wasn't sure though if it was in Rhodes. I don't ever remember it being called that. But I was pretty sure Sykes Pico was way before that and only the first draft. So I got the right answer. So we're back to a 50/50 which is better than not getting it right and the new score of Rabbi Schwartz having a 17 points and the MOT having 7 points on this latest Ministry of Tourism exam.
No comments:
Post a Comment