from the
Holy Land
from
Rabbi Ephraim Schwartz
"Your friend in Karmiel"
June 12th 2026 -Volume 16 Issue 33 27th of Sivan 5786
Parshat (Shelach II)/ & Korach
Highway One
(LAST WEEK'S And THIS WEEK'S EDITION although both contain are on both parshas!)
Click here below for print edition
Parshat Shelach (and behaloscha II)
( Weekly Newsletter - Parshat Shelach )
And parshat Korach and Shelach II
(Weekly Newsletter - Parshat Korach )
I think there's something symbolic that strikes me by the fact that we here in Eretz Yisrael are reading a different parsha then you guys are over there in the Diaspora. While you guys are still struggling with the challenges and questions of if this is a good land to live in, to move to, to give up the false sense of superior Torah in the mibdar, and the even more false sense of security that you feel over there- even without the clouds of Glory that we seem to have here. While you guys are wondering if it's worthwhile to leave the yeshiva of Moshe Rabbeinu and actually take a gun and fight and eradicate the enemy in the army of Yehoshua- and if your children can handle that or not. Here in Israel we're passed that point already. We've finished that parsha already. We know the land is very very good. We know clearly that it is only here Hashem wants us to live and build His home. We learned the lesson that the Torah of Moshe in galus is not really where it's meant to be learned. We tragically even know that if we decide we don't want to come, then we will die pathetically in that midbar, our corpses will fall there. And maybe if we're lucky our children will learn from our mistakes and come in.
Yes, we learned that parsha. We're one ahead of you. We're on the streets fighting and screaming at one another. We're in Parshat Korach over here. We have some of us screaming how we are all equal. We all need to share the burden. We have others saying, "No! We're the tribe of Levi". We need to be dedicated to the Torah. To the Holy service. We have people scorning the spiritual leaders. We have rabblerousers. We have demonstrations. Name calling. Fists flying. And the Highway to Eretz Yisrael- the Kvish Chotzeh Aretz is being blocked by these fights. The Highway ONE isn't moving. It's stuck in this traffic.
Interestingly enough the one thing we don't have is a Moshe and Aharon that is literally going over to the tent of the Attorney General of Israel- who is probably no less of a rasha then Dasan and Aviram were- who have been a thorn in our side since Egypt when Moshe first met them fighting- and coming to her in humility or to Bennet or any of these other idiots, and asking them to make peace. Wouldn't that be a sight?! Now don't you have a better appreciation of that act of Moshe and Aharon and the eternal lesson that Chazal say we need to take from that today. But that's just an aside.
Yup, so here we are dealing with our parsha, you guys are dealing with yours, but at the end of the day- guess what? Despite what us Aliyah snobs might tell you, it's abundantly clear- that despite the Knicks winning the championships, Mashiach is still not here. We're stuck. We're almost there. But the road is blocked. Some of us it seems, may sadly not even make it to the land. Others tragically if we don't get this right might get swallowed up and/or burnt up in the fires of machlokes that are raging and preventing us from getting to that place we've longed to for so so long. That was promised to our shared great grand father Avraham. The place where Dovid Ha'Melech as well didn't live to see be built. The place where our Father in heaven can finally be one with His children and we can finally realize that dream of retzoneinu li'ros Malkeinu- to see our King rule over the entire world.
So how do get there? How do we finally enter the land and build that House? I just completed this week the Book of Shoftim, two weeks after I finished the Book of Yehoshua. I saw this amazing program in memory of a soldier where if you learn wo perakim a day, you can finish the entire Nach by next year Shavuos, when I started it. The one theme that seems to ride through both books is these two failures. On the one hand, despite Yehoshua and Klal Yisrael conquering the land, and killing many of the enemies and nations there. We didn't finish the job. We didn't do what Hashem repeatedly told us we need to do. We became fat and satisfied with a Jewish state where we could worship freely, but alongside those idolatrous foreign nations that were living there. We left the Plishtim in Gaza. We left many Canaanim in the "West Bank". Amalek was still walking around threatening us. And we were dealing with Midyan, Aram and all the other nations that saw that we really weren't that serious about truly cleansing the land of all idolatry for the Shechina to truly be revealed. We just wanted to be left in peace.
Actually, I really want to take part of what I said right now back. These weren't in fact foreign nations that were living in Israel. These were Canaanite nations living in Canaan. In fact this was their land not ours. Our job wasn't to liberate our biblical ancestral homeland from oppressors that threw us out. Rather it was to be conquerors to ruthlessly come into their land and kill them all; men women and children and announce that it was now ours. Why? Because Hashem told us to. Sounds crazy, right? It so much more comfortable for us to say that we're taking back our land. But that's not the truth. That really doesn't reveal Hashem. Any nation in the world could and would claim to do that without god and rectify that injustice. Eretz Yisrael is about so much more. It's about what I said…
If you don't believe me, by the way. It's time to open up the Chumash and read the first Rashi that introduces the Torah. Don't have a Chumash handy? I'll quote it for you. Rashi asks, why the Torah which seemingly should be a book about Jewish laws and our national history begin with the story of Creation. So he quotes Rabbi Yitzchak…
Now for what reason did He begin the Torah with “- Bereishis -In the beginning?” Because of the verse “The strength of His works He related to His people, to give them the inheritance of the nations” (Ps. 111:6).
For if the nations of the world should say to Israel, “You are robbers, for you conquered by force the lands of the seven nations [of Canaan],”
They will reply, "The entire earth belongs to Hakadosh Baruch Hu. He created it and gave it to whomever He deemed proper When He wished, He gave it to them, and when He wished, He took it away from them and gave it to us.
Did you get that? Our job, our function, the purpose of the entire Creation, the introduction to the entire Torah is one thing. Hashem created the world. He runs and controls and owns the entire world. He owns America. Russia. Europe. Saudi Arabia and Iran. How will they know that? How will His Kingdom reign on the entire world? When our nation will come us as His ambassadors and messengers to the world and take over and wipe out the seven nations whom he had originally allowed and even given the land to. And when the world might or perhaps will certainly ask us in the United Nations what right we have to do that? Our response won't be because we need a place to live. Because after the Holocaust we deserve to have a place. It won't be because we don't have any other country to call our own. It won't even be because this land was promised to Avraham, Yitzchak and Yaakov and it certainly won't be because we once lived here for about a thousand or so years. Rather there is one answer that we are meant to give them. Only one that is the Kiddush Hashem that Hashem is waiting for us to make.
That answer is koach ma'asuv hi'gid l'amo- Hashem created the entire world. He is the King over your nations as well. And yes He gave this land to these wonderful evil deviant Arabs until now. But guess what? Now He gave it to us. He's a King. He can do those types of things. He's your King as well. He told us to kill them all. And we did. Yes, even their women and babies. He told us to wipe out every alternate form of worship from the land- He told us that by the way repeatedly. And so we did. The churches. The mosques. The bamos. The Temple. We destroyed them all. We didn't even have any shtibalch or shuls of our own. Because that's also a bama- a private house of worship to Hashem. No. When we came here we built Him one house, where we all come to see Him and daven together in. That's the Kiddush Hashem. That will make the world better. That will reveal Him to the world.
Sefer Yehoshua and Sefer Shoftim are complete with the error of not fulfilling that mission. Of not eradicating our enemies and bringing the chilul Hashem and chilul Ha'Aretz to an end. We had eras of peace in these two books, even periods of serious Torah study and fulfillment of mitzvos. But we never really cleaned up the land to build that Mikdash. We got stuck in traffic. We were in Israel, but the truth is it was like we were living in America almost. We were still somewhat in galus here in Israel. Because even here we didn't fully appreciate what we were meant to do. What the ultimate goal was. How learning Torah and mitzvos and even settling portions of the land wasn't enough. And all of the reminders Hashem sent us with our neighbors constantly attacking us still didn't wake us up to what we were truly brought here to do. Our mission here was never to create a Jewish state in the Middle East. Not even a Torah state… shhhh….It was about a land conquered and cleansed where the Shechina could shine out to the entire world from the dedication and sacrifice of the conquest of that land to reveal His glory as Creator and King of the world.
The failure to get that, is the sin of the meraglim back then, who didn't understand that was our purpose. That didn't get that message of Yehoshua and Kaleiv that we could do that if Hashem tells us. That nothing could stand in our way when we have that mission and Aron in our midst. As well it was the sin of the ma'apilim, who instead felt that they could go up and conquer and settle the land without Hashem in their midst. Without the Aron. Without Moshe. That they could just walk in there and claim the land and live in it as a holy Jewish state, and even eat the fruits of the land and fulfill those special mitzvos. That they could learn Torah in the land and it would be worthwhile- even if they left the Mishkan and Ark behind. That they could overcome Amalek and finally win this stupid three-thousand-year-old war that we're still fighting without the Bais HaMikdash and eradication of evil and cleansing of the land as the ultimate mission and goal to accomplish. It was their sin then. It's ours today.
Parshat Korach however contains the second part of our sin and our traffic block. It's what we here in Eretz Yisrael are still suffering from today and that is blocking Highway One, the One-ness of Hashem from being revealed. For Hashem and the Bais Ha'Mikdash to descend we all have to be united. We all have to be there, as we were on Mt. Sinai- k'ish echa b'leiv echad- like one man with one heart. It's a lesson and message we never got and we still haven't today.
In the book of Yehoshua and Shoftim we're told about 36 Jews that were killed in the battle of the city of Ai. Imaginably with the different accounts and wars and terrorization that we suffered from the other nations there were probably hundreds more over the 300 years of those periods. Yet, those numbers don't even come close to the number of Jews that were killed in the civil wars. In the fight in the period of Yiftach between Ephraim and Menashe- (remember how everyone says how those two brothers are the ones that always got along… well those people never learned Tanach). Menashe and the family of Yiftach slaughtered 42,000 members of the tribe of Ephraim. The final story in the book of Shoftim of Pilegesh B'Givah is perhaps even more insane. Binyamin kills 40,000 of the tribes of Israel in two wars (that took two days!!) and the tribes of Israel wipe out 25,400 of Binyamin. Almost every man and woman and yes… even their babies, the verse and commentaries tell us. That's over 107,000 from our internal fighting. We're not even going to open the book of Shmuel and the civil war of Avshalom which claimed another 20,000 and in Melachim where the battles between the Northern Kingdom between Aviya and Yeravam claimed according to Divrei Ha'Yamim… ready for this… 500,000!!!.
The enemies from without isn't our major problem. It's our inability to come together and realize that we need each other to reveal the shechina, to build Hashem a Shabbos table where all His children are sitting around it. The question is how do we get there? How is it possible. What can we do and what tools has Hashem given us to fulfill this even more difficult and life-threatening mission.
Korach and his followers and nation had a plan. They looked at Klal Yisrael and said the problem is that there's too many tiers. We're all holy. We were all at Sinai. We all want to see Hashem. We're all techeiles. We're all a reflection of Hashem and that throne of His. We all want to see our King. The first borns of every family should have a representative. Dasan and Aviram even said Egypt is a land of Milk and Honey. The whole world is the glory of Hashem. He's preaching achdus. He's preaching unity. They're saying Jews all over the place can be one in their heart. We don't need Aharon. We don't need High Priests. We don't need a tribe of Levi even that has no portion in the land of Israel. That are shaved down of all of their hair and that are picked up and thrown around by Moshe and Aharon to be servants of the rest of Klal Yisrael. To protect the Kodesh. To dedicate their lives to watching over the Ark. To singing songs to Hashem all day. We can all do that. We all want to come into the Kodesh. They missed the message of Nadav and Avihu that had a similar holy desire. They got burned up as well.
The message they missed is that our unity can't come, is impossible to be achieved without Aharon. Without the Levites. And there's two parts to that. It's the marriage of those two parts that bring achdus. It's about Klal Yisrael understanding our role and the Levi understanding its. Klal Yisrael has to understand the desire to see Hashem can never be a personal one. It has to be a national one. It's not about me achieving my personal spiritual connection with Hashem. Because then its about me and not about Hashem. Rather our focus has to be how to create a connected united reflection of Hashem in this world. How to blend into a tapestry rather than to stand out shine out your own personal colors and light. To do that one needs to have a melaveh- some one that brings us all together. We have to become one with the song that he sings to Hashem, we have to stand and understand where our place on the stage is rather than each one of us trying to grab the mike and put on our own personal show. The Levi is the one that brings us and watches that we stay in our place. The Kohein, Aharon and his descendants are the representatives of Hashem bringing that one united offering and to Him and bringing His Shechina down to us.
Perhaps even more critical than that job and mission that we have is the job and challenge the Levi has and the role he is meant to play. The Levi doesn't have a piece of the Eretz Yisrael. He has no official citizen rights that doesn't come from the nation itself. He is a servant of the people. His job is to inspire. To bring them to that stage. To enlighten them. To keep them on track. To make sure that we don't kill each other trying to make it on our own.
I don't believe it's a wonder then that the story of the idol of Micha at the end of Shoftim has as it's central figure the Levi who doesn't fulfill that role and is out for his own personal aggrandizement. Fascinatingly enough Chazal tell us that Levi was in fact the grandson of Moshe, the son of Gershom himself! As well and even more striking is that the story of Pilegesh B'Givah as well is a story of Levi that started this whole thing, and it ends with none less than Pinchas- the son of Aharon who Hashem made covenant of peace with leading us into this civil war that killed 70,000 of us.
Chazal tell us that Pinchas sinned as well by Yiftach by not communicating with him about the annulment of his vow, which as well led to the civil war between brothers Ephraim and Menashe. He waited for Yiftach to approach him, Yiftach waited for Pinchas. And we all died because we couldn't talk. We couldn't communicate. We protested instead. We didn't respect them. They didn't respect us. The gadol ha'dor didn't go to the tents of the evil doers. The tribe of Levi didn't bring the nation together. And when they don't do their job. When they're focused on their own rights. Their own stipends. Their own Torah. When they don't realize that the function of that Torah is to create a song that all will sing to Hashem. To bring us all close to Him. To build that Bais Ha'Mikdash and shut down our own personal minyanim. Then all hell breaks loose. Chaos reigns. The Highway to Hashem is blocked.
This Shabbos I begin the next book of the prophets. It is the book of Shmuel. Shmuel, who is the equal of Moshe and Aharon. Shmuel is the Levi that fixes it all. He is the one, in this week- in Israel's haftorah- that anoints us our first King Shaul from that very tribe of Binyamin that we just waged a war against and that killed so many of us. He is the one that charges Shaul with killing and eradicating Amalek as we are united and expresses his disappointment and Hashem's when we don't do that fully. He is the one that will anoint Dovid Ha'Melech. He is the one that will reveal the Makom Ha'Mikdash finally together with him. Yet he is also the man of the people. He is someone that will travel the width and breadth (are those the same things?) of Eretz Yisrael and teach the nation. He will bring them together. He's what we need to be today. He's the new book that Klal Yisrael needs to get to, to finally achieve the day that we are longing for.
This week both in Israel and the States we will bless the new month of Tamuz. It's the month when the spies were in Israel and they got it wrong. It's the month where until this year we fasted on the 17th of this month to remember and atone for that sin of the Golden Calf. When we started looking for alternatives to seeing Hashem and Moshe leading us into Israel. May this year, that day finally turn into a day of celebration, as our prophets tell us it will become. We just need to get out of the traffic jam that is holding us up.
Have a spectacular Shabbos
Rabbi Ephraim Schwartz
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YIDDISH PROVERB OF THE WEEK
" Oif fremder erd boit men nit." – One doesn't build on foreign land (halevai…)
RABBI SCHWARTZ'S TOUR GUIDE EXAM QUESTION OF THE WEEK
answer below at end of Email
3. According to Josephus Flavius, the name of the latest wall built in Jerusalem during the Second Temple period was ____ .
Thanks to which of the following findings was Masada declared a World Heritage Site?
A. The synagogue
B. The water system
C. The Byzantine church
D. Remains of the Roman siege
RABBI SCHWARTZ'S COOL VIDEO OF THE WEEK
https://soundcloud.com/ephraim-schwartz/eretz-tu-bishvat – In honor of the Eretz Yisrael love parsha… My song which is the tikkun of it all Eretz Yisrael! Dovid Lowy on vocals and arrangements… listen till end it's fun!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9bq-wGegM4 - Yitzi Ackerman- spent Shabbos with him a few months ago… beautiful song Ata Meyuchad
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4q6wAuL7qY- This week was reb Yishmale Kohen Gadol (across the street from me) yartzeit and this Moshe Laufer Avraham Fried release of Tiher Rebbi Yishmael is magnificent
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3OCLmYuziOE&list=RD3OCLmYuziOE&start_radio=1 – Only Reb Levi Yitzchak would be able to meilitz yosher and perhaps even enjoy this new TYH group and style of music that this new kids group in His name The Bardichevers put out!
RABBI SCHWARTZ'S ERA’S AND THEIR PLACES AND PEOPLE IN ISRAEL OF THE WEEK
2nd Inauguration- -346 BC- Hooray! We got the permits to complete the work of building the second Bais HaMikdash. We did our hishtadlus. We started even before we got our permits from Darius and Persia. We listened to the prophets and did it anyways. Thus setting the precedent for all Israeli construction to follow… It's the way things get done in this country!
The next precedent is that it took 4 years… whew.. Projects take time in this country. And this wasn't even a glorious building like Herod's which will come in another few hundred years. This was a smaller humble mostly wooden construction. The work completed on 3rd of Adar in the 6th year of the reign of Darius just in time for Pesach preparations. The big inauguration ceremony took place in the building, although all the while they had been bringing sacrifices on the altar that had been established. Yet this was a big deal. The biggest ever since Shlomo.
There were 100 cows offered, 200 rams, 400 sheep, as well as sin offerings to atone for…. All the Jews that didn't come back and stayed in galus. See.. we care about you. And if you don't make it this time as well. We'll bring your sin offering. Don't worry. Enjoy Tom's River Smash Burger. The ones that came back were mostly Yehuda and Binyamin and they brought the Pesach offering as well that year. Darius sent his best wishes and blessings as well. We had come home. We were officially back in business after almost a century!
Yet all that being said. It wasn't the same. The Shechina wasn't there this time. It was a chilul Hashem. It was the building we built with Darius's permission. There were none of the miracles of the first Temple of Shlomo. It was a politically correct Temple. That's not what Hashem was looking for. If you don't know why, read the E-Mail above. Yet it was something. Next week we begin the return of Ezra with the Jews that held out. The Jews that missed the building but at least had enough brains to come to experience and dwell here. Unfortunately it wasn't all of us. It still isn't. It's time to change that. When ya comin?
RABBI SCHWARTZ’S TERRIBLE TRAFFIC JOKES OF THE WEEK
A policeman stops a car that is going very slowly on the I40 highway, and says to the driver "Why are you going so slow? You're holding up traffic!"
"Well," says the man, "the signs say I40."
"That's the road number," says the policeman, "not the speed limit."
Then he notices a woman in the back seat, trembling all over. "Is your passenger all right, sir?" he asks.
"Don't worry officer," says the man, "my wife is always like that when we come off Hwy I170
I was sitting at a traffic light yesterday, minding my own business patiently waiting for it to turn green even though there was no on-coming traffic. A carload of bearded, young, loud Muslims, shouting Anti-American Slogans, with a half-burned American flag duct-taped on the side of their car and a "FREE PALESTINE" slogan spray painted on the side, was stopped next to me.
Suddenly they yelled, " Allahu Akbar!, Allahu Akbar!, " and took off before the lights changed.
Out of nowhere, an 18-wheeler came speeding through the intersection and ran directly over their car, crushing it completely and killing everyone in it. For several minutes I sat in my car stunned, thinking to myself,"man...that could have been me!"
So today, bright and early, I went out and got a job as a truck driver.
"What did the traffic light say to the traffic light? Don't look, I'm changing.
As the coffin was being lowered into the ground at a Traffic Officers funeral, a voice from inside screams: "I'm not dead, I'm not dead. Let me out!"
The Rabbi smiles, leans forward sucking air through his teeth and mutters: "Too late pal, I've already done the paperwork.
Why was Vladimir involved in a traffic accident on the way to the airport in Moscow? He was Russian, and ran a red light.
A man driving a Kia stops at a traffic light next to a Rolls-Royce. The Kia driver rolls down his window and calls out to the Rolls-Royce driver, "Hey, pal, that's an impressive car. Does your Rolls have Wi-Fi? My Kia does!"
The Rolls-Royce driver replies, "Yes, it has Wi-Fi."
The Kia driver continues, "Nice! And do you have a fridge in there? I have a fridge in the backseat of my Kia!"
The Rolls-Royce driver, getting irritated, responds, "Yes, there's a refrigerator."
Not backing down, the Kia driver asks, "That's cool, man! What about a TV? I've got a TV in my Kia's backseat!"
The Rolls-Royce driver, increasingly annoyed, says, "Yes, there's a television. A Rolls-Royce is the epitome of luxury vehicles!"
The Kia driver says, "Amazing car! But, do you have a bed in there? I've got a bed in the back of my Kia!"
Frustrated that his car lacks a bed, the Rolls-Royce driver speeds off. He heads straight to the dealership and orders a bed to be installed in his Rolls. The following morning, he picks up his car, and the bed looks fantastic, complete with silk sheets and elegant brass accents. It's undoubtedly a bed suited for a Rolls-Royce.
The Rolls-Royce driver spends the entire day searching for the Kia. Finally, late that night, he spots the Kia parked with fogged-up windows. He gets out of his Rolls-Royce and knocks on the Kia's window. At first, there's no response, but then the owner pokes his head out, dripping wet.
"I now have a bed in the back of my Rolls-Royce," the Rolls-Royce driver declares smugly.
The Kia driver replies, "Did you really drag me out of the shower just to tell me that?!
A huge traffic jam appeared on the highway of Tehran. Most people got out of their cars to see what’s going on. In the distance they spotted a man holding a donation box. As the man was walking from car to car he got stopped by one upset driver.
The driver proceeded to ask him “what’s going on? Why are we being stopped here for hours already?”
The man trying to explain says “well the Ayatolla got kidnapped and the kidnappers are asking for 10 million or they’re going to cover him in fuel and set him on fire.”
The driver obviously shocked asks “well are the people giving something?”
And the man says “ yeah they do. Like 5,6… liters..
A woman was found guilty in traffic court and when asked for her occupation she said she was a schoolteacher. The judge rose from the bench. "Madam, I have waited years for a schoolteacher to appear before this court."
He smiled with delight. "Now sit down at that table and write, 'I will not run a red light' five hundred times."
A man was driving down the road when a policeman stopped him. The officer looked in the back of the man’s truck and said, “Why are these penguins in your truck?”
The man replied, “These are my penguins. They belong to me.”
“You need to take them to the zoo,” the policeman said.
The next day, the officer saw the same guy driving down the road. He pulled him over again. He saw the penguins were still in the truck, but they were wearing sunglasses this time. “I thought I told you to take these penguins to the zoo!”, the officer said.
“I did,” the man replied. “And today I’m taking them to the beach
A truck carrying Vicks Vapor Rub overturned on the highway, but amazingly traffic was fine.
No congestion for hours!
A duck was standing by a busy roadside, waiting for a break in traffic as cars went roaring by
A chicken walks up and says, "don't do it, mate. You'll never hear the end of it."
Why do traffic lights turn red? You would too if you had to change in the middle of the street!
While driving to work this morning I rear-ended a car at a traffic light. When the driver got out... I noticed that he was a dwarf.
He steamed up to my car and said, 'I'm not happy...'.
So I said, 'Well, which one are you then?'
What does a cop with Alzheimers always say at routines traffic stops, “Do you know why I pulled you over???”. ( I gotta have at least one each week that I probably shouldn't have put out there…)
I was sitting in traffic the other day . Probably why I got run over- the yeshiva bachur said…
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The answer to this week's question is D– I wasn't sure about this, but I guessed right. Proud of myself. I guessed it was the Choma Ha'Shlishit. It was a quasi-educated guess. As it is the wall that actually goes past the current old city walls. To where that rechov is today in the Russian compound and Muswara neighborhoods where one can see remains of it still. It was built by Aggripas the son of Herod to expand the old city walls. Pretty cool I remembered that. On the other hand I got the Masada question wrong. I went with the Shul, which I should've in retrospect known was wrong. The UN isn't a fan of old shuls and its not the only one. The reason why I didn't go with the siege Roman one which was the correct answer is because its debatable in todays times the whole story. Yet, that's really only a question if they made that hill with the battering ram. But the siege part around is definitely real. So I got a 50/50 on this on and the test continues with Rabbi Schwartz having 2 points and the MOT having 1 points on this latest Ministry of Tourism exam.
