Leah’s Blog June 27 2015
June 27 2015
Leah’s Blog
The thing that hit me in the face on arriving home last week is how not too long ago we sang a Tzvika Pik song “Pitome Kam Adam Baboker oo margeesh ki hoo Am vematchil lalechet” (Suddenly we woke up in the morning, feeling like a nation and began to walk). The open fields surrounding Ben Gurion Airport are now beautiful neighborhoods, and the full blast of Israel developing hits you, its vigorous burgeoning growth is past the stage of beginning to walk- it is fast forward running- ahead of the times, beautiful trains, buses and roads are bringing people to modern yet still ancient destinations in a force you cannot ignore. This is making it invincible – sturdy as an ox, strong as a lion, it stands broad shouldered boasting skyscrapers that stand defiant to a world policy calling for it to shrink, to be silent, to climb back into bed.
You are infused with an energy here wherever you go ,an electrical energy that sends off a life spirit that can only be holy but so upbeat at the same time. In our revival the pace even quickens as our enemies try to build a fire under it but in their psyche know their plot can’t work. We are always one step, one lurch ahead. As we come close in time again on our calendar to the time of year that we mourn for our destroyed Temple and Jerusalem, it takes on a new logic of the heart as Jerusalem is full of musicians on every corner playing a klezmer or tune, tourists from all over the globe and Israelis in a coat of many colors swell it’s streets. You are cast under a spell and join the masses , bewitched. This soon solemn time takes on a new era of hopeful optimistic prayer to fix things even faster, to restore – ASAP. The people of Israel, after all we have endured have duress like none other. The charisma of the summer here, so colorful and full feels like a blessing.
But as Hashem is making miracles happen, it lies in our own power in this coming of age- of our not walking anymore but running, making it happen. We hold the aces. This is why it pains me when I go to Brooklyn I see people going about their lives as if Israel wasn’t alive and kicking. For them at best it’s a place to take a holiday and taking leave of it causes no heart strain. Some never even come nor do they want to. They remain betzimtzum hadaat and have not heard the call. The torah very clearly illustrates that when Yosef HaTzaddik called out to his brothers and proclaimed “Kama Nitzava!” “My wheat shaft is standing!” (Israel’s skyscrapers are standing! Israel’s ancient holy sites are being revived! The Land is pouring milk and honey!)that it was for his brothers, not the world. The world came to know Yosef and all he stood for, in all he gave without him having to spell it out for them. It was his brothers precisely who needed to be told .But they remained and remain silent and small. In bed. This tugs at me since I know soon their silence will be deafened by the loud sound of heart soul and spirit making a great Yom Truah!
Shabbat Shalom, Leah Goldsmith
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