Tag Archives: Adam and Eve

What Does God Ask Of You?

In this week’s parasha, Ekev, we read: “And now, Israel, what does Hashem, your God, ask of you? Only to fear Hashem, your God, to walk in all of His ways, and to love Him, and to serve Hashem, your God, with all your heart and with all your soul.” (Deuteronomy 10:12) Moses instructs his people that they should sincerely love, fear, and serve God. We have written in the past how the Sages say that loving God and serving God is often best done by loving and serving His creations. The Midrash compares this to a servant who takes care of the king’s son. Surely, the king will love such a servant and wish to bestow goodness upon him, for the servant cares for the king’s beloved child. As the Torah calls us all children of Hashem, the King, it goes without saying that those who take care of God’s children are naturally beloved by God.

This is the quality that made Aaron so special, and, according to some, earned him the merit of being chosen the progenitor of the priestly lineage. Pirkei Avot (1:12) famously instructs us to be, above all else, like Aaron (and his disciples): “loving peace and pursuing peace, loving all people, and bringing them closer to Torah.” Elsewhere in Avot (3:10), we are told that “One with whom his fellows are pleased with, God is pleased with.” The Kabbalists beautifully point out that the gematria of the command to love God (ואהבת את יי אלהיך) is 907, the same as the command to love your fellow (ואהבת לרעך כמוך אני יי), for one is impossible without the other.

‘Micah Extorting the Israelites to Repentance’, by Gustave Doré

This is what the prophet Michah concluded when he, too, asked the same question as Moses did: “… And what does Hashem request of you? Only to act justly, and to love kindness, and to walk modestly with your God.” (Micah 6:8) Be just and treat everyone fairly; be kind and genuinely love to help others—and do it all humbly and modestly.

The Talmud (Shabbat 31a) takes a more literal approach, with Rava stating that God will ask each person six specific questions upon their death:

When man is led in for Judgment, he is asked: Did you deal faithfully? Did you fix times for learning? Did you engage in procreation? Did you hope for salvation? Did you engage in the dialectics of wisdom? Did you understand one thing from another?

The first question implies dealing honestly in business or in financial matters. Judaism has always taught the necessity of being scrupulously honest when it comes to money. The Kabbalists state that a person will be forced to reincarnate into this world if they so much as owe a single penny. They discuss how the value of shekel (שקל) is 430, equal to nefesh (נפש), “soul”, for each person’s material wealth is intricately tied to their spiritual nature. This is why giving money to charity can actually alter a person’s fate, as explained in the past. (See ‘How Charity Can Save Your Life’ in Garments of Light.)

Meanwhile, the Talmud holds that even though the Torah allows Jews to loan with interest to non-Jews, one shouldn’t charge interest from anyone, and a usurer might not even be a kosher witness in court (Sanhedrin 24b-25b). The same is true for someone who owes a lot of money. A person should not get themselves into great debt, and should ensure as much as possible that they will be able to repay a loan. This is why Rabbi Shimon, one of the five great students of Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai, held that the worst possible trait is that of a person who takes on debt and fails to repay (Avot 2:10). He bases himself on the words of King David: “The wicked man borrows and does not repay, but the righteous one is benevolent and gives.” (Psalms 37:21)

The wording of the Talmud is that a person will be asked if they took care of their finances b’emunah, “in faith”. Unfortunately, there are plenty of people who seem faithful, but engage in all kinds of financial tricks under the table. A person cannot be of great emunah if, at the same time, they cheat in financial matters, or are even a little bit dishonest with money. This includes gambling, stock market speculation, and all sorts of tax deceptions which have become so commonplace in our time.

Upholding Creation

The second question asked in the afterlife is whether a person set aside regular times to learn Torah. The Sages state that learning Torah is the most important mitzvah. Indeed, without learning Torah a person won’t know the right way to fulfil any mitzvah. The Torah is a “Tree of life for those who grasp it” (Proverbs 3:18), and the Sages quoted God stating: “I created the evil inclination, and I created the Torah as its antidote.” (Sifre Devarim 45) One who learns Torah is upholding the Covenant between God and Israel—since the Torah is the very text of that Covenant—and hence God states “If not for My covenant day and night, I would not have set the ordinances of Heaven and Earth.” (Jeremiah 33:25) God declares that He would not have created this universe were it not for His Torah—and His people upholding it day and night. (Some have therefore said that the world has time zones so that at any given moment, a Jew somewhere in the world is learning Torah.)

Similarly, the third question refers to procreation, for without it, too, humanity would cease to exist. More specifically, without Jewish procreation, there would be no Jews, and therefore no one to uphold that Covenant. The schools of Hillel and Shammai debated what it takes to fulfil the mitzvah of procreation (Yevamot 62a). According to Hillel, a person must have one boy and one girl, while according to Shammai, a person must have two boys and two girls. The reasoning of the latter is that Eve initially had four children: Cain, Abel, and the sisters each was born with. The first instance of pru u’rvu in the Torah resulted in two boys and two girls, so this is the standard for fulfilling the mitzvah.

However, the Talmud goes on to note another opinion that it was Shammai that taught one must have at least one boy and one girl, whereas Hillel taught that a person must simply have at least one child, whether boy or girl. The most lenient opinion, therefore, is that a person fulfils the mitzvah by having a single child, while the praiseworthy has at least two of each. A person who adopts a child or “raises an orphan” fulfils the mitzvah as well (Megillah 13a).

Of course, it isn’t enough just to have the kids. Parents need to invest their time and energy to ensure the children will be both righteous and successful. The Talmud (Kiddushin 29a) reminds us that, among other things, a parent is obligated to teach their child Torah, and also some kind of craft or career to ensure an honest livelihood. After all, “If there is no Torah, there is no flour; if there is no flour, there is no Torah.” (Avot 3:17) To raise children solely with Torah and assume a livelihood will come on its own, or to rely on the charity of others, is a gross sin. The Rambam (Hilkhot Talmud Torah 3:10) is particularly vocal about it:

Anyone who comes to the conclusion that he should involve himself in Torah study without doing work and derive his livelihood from charity, desecrates God’s Name, dishonors the Torah, extinguishes the light of faith, brings evil upon himself, and forfeits the life of the World to Come, for it is forbidden to derive benefit from the words of Torah in this world.

Our Sages declared: “Whoever benefits from the words of Torah forfeits his life in the world.” Also, they commanded and declared: “Do not make them a crown to magnify oneself, nor an axe to chop with.” Also, they commanded and declared: “Love work and despise rabbinic positions.” All Torah that is not accompanied by work will eventually be negated and lead to sin. Ultimately, such a person will steal from others.

Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, the Rambam, aka. Maimonides, 1135-1204

Although the Rambam makes it clear that Torah study is of absolute importance, and should take precedence over one’s worldly occupation, he nonetheless reminds us that “the greatest sages of Israel were lumberjacks and water-drawers…” (ibid., 1:9) To be fair, there are other rabbinic authorities that allow for full-time Torah scholars who make learning their occupation, but this must only be for a minority of distinguished thinkers. It is certainly not a standard for everyone, for that would be completely unsustainable.

To get back to the third question, the Sages state that having children “hastens the Redemption”. There are a certain number of souls (in a Heavenly repository called “guf”) that must be born, and only when all of these souls have been born can Mashiach come. Thus, having children accelerates the time of Redemption.

This ties into the fourth question a person is asked: did they look forward to the Redemption? The wording is not if they waited for the Redemption, or hoped for it. Instead, whether they looked forward to it, suggesting a more active form. It isn’t enough to passively wait for the Redemption. Each person must do what they can to hasten it. This includes things like doing more acts of kindness and showing ahavat chinam, expressing baseless, non-judgemental love for all fellow Jews (Yoma 9b); engaging in kiruv; and, of course, repenting wholeheartedly (Sanhedrin 97b). Each person has to continue working on themselves to be ever-more righteous. Increasing one’s charitable donations hastens the Redemption, too (Isaiah 1:27 and Bava Batra 10a).

Garment for the Soul

The final two questions deal with one’s knowledge and understanding. It isn’t enough to engage in light learning here and there. A person must be steeped in dialectics (pilpul) and understand the depths of one thing from another (davar mitokh davar). The Arizal taught that a person must learn Torah on all four of its levels; pshat (simple), remez (sub-textual), drash (metaphorical), and sod (secret). These levels are collectively known by the acronym pardes, “orchard”—a word that is also the origin of the English “paradise”. One who doesn’t learn Torah on all four levels has not fulfilled the mitzvah of Torah study and will return in a reincarnation to do so (Sha’ar HaGilgulim, 16).

The Arizal also taught that Torah study not only strengthens a person spiritually, but literally creates a “garment” for the soul to be worn in the World to Come (Sha’ar HaPesukim, Tehillim). This is the meaning of the verse “The Torah of Hashem is perfect, it restores the soul” (Psalms 19:8). Meanwhile, the power of Torah study is so great that it creates angels, and these angels could eventually communicate with the student and bestow Ruach HaKodesh, divine inspiration, upon them (Sha’ar Ruach HaKodesh, 1).

The Talmud specifies that one should spend a third of their time studying Tanakh, then a third studying Mishnah, and a third studying Gemara (Kiddushin 30a). This was at a time when no other texts were available, so one should probably make another “third” for the many other areas of Jewish study we have today, including halachic and midrashic literature, mussar, hashkafa, various responsas and commentaries, as well as Kabbalah. The Arizal divided up his Torah study routine as follows (Sha’ar HaMitzvot, Va’etchanan):

First, he would read the weekly Torah portion. On Sunday, he would focus on the first six verses. On Monday, the next four. On Tuesday, the next five, and on Wednesday the next six. Another five on Thursday, making a total of 26 verses, and then the whole parasha on Friday. This was done in the traditional manner, shnaim mikra v’echad targum—reading each verse twice in Hebrew, and once in Aramaic.

Next, he would study a portion of Nevi’im, the Prophets, followed by Ketuvim, the other Holy Writings that make up the Tanakh. This, too, was done with shnaim mikra and a targum. The Arizal then studied the Mishnah, followed by Gemara, together with the various commentaries. Finally, he engaged in Kabbalah.

Yirat Hashem

Rava derived the six questions above from Isaiah 33:6, where the prophet declares, “And there shall be faith in your times; strength, salvation, wisdom and knowledge…” Faith refers to the first question regarding faithful business, times refers to the second question of setting times for Torah-learning, strength to procreation, salvation to the Redemption, wisdom and knowledge to the last two questions.

The Isaiah verse concludes with “… the fear of Hashem is His treasure.” One’s rewards (treasure) in the afterlife are contingent upon these six questions. Yet, what unifies them all is yirat Hashem, “fear” or “awe” of God.

One who is truly God-fearing will undoubtedly be scrupulously honest with financial matters, and strive to hasten the Redemption. It is doubtful that a Jew can be truly God-fearing without constantly meditating upon Torah and understanding its depths. Thus, complete yirat Hashem encompasses all of these things. Conversely, a person who does not live these ideals is probably not as God-fearing or faithful as they might believe themselves to be.

The Mystical Meaning of Exile and Terrorism

This week we read the parasha of Bechukotai, famous for its list of blessings, and curses, should Israel faithfully follow God’s law, or not. In Leviticus 26:33, God warns that “I will scatter you among the nations, and I will draw out the sword after you; and your land shall be a desolation, and your cities shall be a waste.” These prophetic words have, of course, come true in Jewish history. Israel has indeed been exiled to the four corners of the world, and experienced just about every kind of persecution. Yet, within every curse there is a hidden blessing.

‘The Flight of the Prisoners’ by James Tissot, depicting the Jewish people being exiled to Babylon.

The Talmud (Pesachim 87b) states that the deeper purpose of exile is for the Jews to spread Godliness to the rest of the world. After all, our very mandate was to be a “light unto the nations” (Isaiah 42:6) and to spread knowledge of Hashem and His Torah. How could we ever accomplish this if we were always isolated in the Holy Land? It was absolutely necessary for Israel to be spread all over the globe in order to introduce people to Hashem, to be a model of righteousness, and to fulfil the various spiritual rectifications necessary to repair this broken world.

The Arizal explains that by praying, reciting blessings, and fulfilling mitzvot, a Jew frees the spiritual sparks trapped within the kelipot, literally “husks”. This idea hearkens back to the concept of Shevirat haKelim, the “Shattering of the Vessels”. The Arizal taught that God initially crafted an entirely perfect universe. Unfortunately, this world couldn’t contain itself and shattered into a multitude of pieces, spiritual “sparks” trapped in this material reality. While God had rebuilt most of the universe, He left it to Adam and Eve to complete the rectification through their own free will. They, too, could not affect that tikkun, and the cosmos shattered yet again. The process repeated itself on a number of occasions, the last major one being at the time of the Golden Calf.

Nonetheless, with each passing phase in history, more and more of those lost, trapped sparks are rediscovered and restored to their rightful place. The mystical mission of every Jew is to free those sparks wherever they go. The Arizal speaks of this at great length, and it permeates every part of his teachings. Eating, for example, serves the purpose of freeing sparks trapped within food—which is why it is so important to consume only kosher food, and to carefully recite blessings (which are nothing but fine-tuned formulas for spiritual rectification) before and after. The same is true with every mitzvah that we do, and every prayer we recite.

Thus, while exile is certainly difficult and unpleasant, it serves an absolutely vital spiritual purpose. This is why the Midrash states that exile is one of four things God created regretfully (Yalkut Shimoni on Isaiah, passage 424). It is why God already prophesied that we would be exiled—even though we hadn’t yet earned such a punishment! And it is why God also guaranteed that we would one day return to our Promised Land, as we have miraculously begun to do in recent decades.

Four, Five, or Eight Exiles?

In Jewish tradition, it is said that there are four major exiles: the Babylonian, the Persian, the Greek, and the Roman. We are still considered to be within the “Roman” or Edomite (European/Christian) exile. Indeed, the Roman Empire never really ended, and just morphed from one phase into another, from the Byzantine Empire to the Holy Roman Empire, and so forth.

Babylonian Shedu

This idea of four exiles originated with Daniel’s vision of four great beasts (Daniel 7:3-7). The first was a lion with eagle wings—a well-known symbol of ancient Babylon. Then came a fierce bear, an animal which the Talmud always likens to the Persians. The swift leopard represents the Greeks that conquered the known world in lightning speed under Alexander the Great. The final and most devastating beast is unidentified, representing the longest and cruelest exile of Edom.

The Midrash states that Jacob himself foresaw these exiles in his vision of the ladder (Genesis 28). There he saw four angels, each going up a number of rungs on the ladder equal to the number of years Israel would be oppressed by that particular nation. The last angel continued to climb ever higher, with Jacob unable to see its conclusion, alluding to the current seemingly never-ending exile.  The big question is: why are these considered the four exiles. Haven’t the Jewish people been exiled all around the world? Have we not been oppressed by other nations besides these?

The Arizal explains (Sha’ar HaMitzvot on Re’eh) that while Jews have indeed been exiled among all seventy root nations, it is only in these four that all Jews were exiled in. Yet, he maintains that any place where even a single Jew has been exiled is considered as if the entire nation was exiled there. The Arizal further explains that these four exiles were already alluded to in Genesis 2:10-14, where the Torah describes the four rivers that emerged from Eden. Each river corresponds to one exile. The head river of Eden that gives rise to the other four corresponds to the very first exile of the Jews, the exile within which the Jewish people were forged: Egypt, the mother of all exiles.

Elsewhere, the Arizal adds that there is actually a fifth exile, that of Ishmael (Etz Ha’Da’at Tov, ch. 62). History makes this plainly evident, of course, as the Jewish people have suffered immensely under Arab and Muslim oppression to this very day. The idea of Ishmael being the final exile was known long before the Arizal, and is mentioned by earlier authorities. In fact, one tradition holds that each exile has two components:

We know that before the Babylonians came to destroy the Kingdom of Judah and its capital Jerusalem, the Assyrians had destroyed the northern Kingdom of Israel with the majority of the Twelve Tribes. We also know that the Persians were united with the Medians. Technically speaking, Alexander the Great was not a mainstream Greek, but a Macedonian. While he was the one who conquered Israel, his treatment of the Jews was mostly fair. It was only long after that the Seleucid Greeks in Syria really tried to extinguish the Jews. Thus, the doublets are Assyria-Babylon (Ashur-Bavel), Persia-Media (Paras-Madai), Macedon-Greece (Mokdon-Yavan), with the final doublet being Edom-Ishmael. The latter has a clear proof-text in the Torah itself, where we read how Esau (ie. Edom) married a daughter of Ishmael (Genesis 28:9). The Sages suggest that this is an allusion to the joint union between Edom and Ishmael to oppress Israel in its final exile.

The Arizal certainly knew the above, so why does he speak of a fifth exile under Ishmael, as well as a fifth (original) exile under Egypt?

The End is Wedged in the Beginning

One of the most well-known principles in Kabbalah is that “the end is wedged in the beginning, and the beginning in the end”. What the Arizal may have been hinting at is that the final Ishmaelite exile is a reflection of the original Egyptian exile. Indeed, the Arizal often speaks of how the final generation at the End of Days is a reincarnation of the Exodus generation. (According to one tradition, there were 15 million Jews in ancient Egypt, just as there are roughly 15 million in the world today.) The first redeemer Moses took us out of the Egyptian exile, and we await Moses’ successor, the final redeemer Mashiach, to free us from the Ishmaelite exile.

In highly symbolic fashion, the land of ancient Egypt is currently occupied by Muslim Arabs. The Ishmaelites have quite literally taken the place of ancient Egypt. Come to think of it, the lands of all the four traditional nations of exile are now Ishmaelite: Bavel is Iraq, Paras is Iran, Seleucid Greece is Syria, and the Biblical land of Edom overlaps Jordan. The four rivers of Eden would have run through these very territories. It is quite ironic that Saddam Hussein openly spoke of himself as a reincarnated Nebuchadnezzar, seeking to restore a modern-day Babylonian Empire. Meanwhile, each day in the news we hear of the looming Syria-Iran threat. Just as Egypt was the mother of all four “beasts”, it appears that the four beasts converge under a new Ishmaelite banner for one final End of Days confrontation.

There is one distinction however. In the ancient land of Egypt, all Jews were physically trapped. We do not see this at all today, where very few Jews remain living in Muslim states. Nonetheless, every single Jew around the world, wherever they may be, is living under an Ishmaelite threat. Muslims in France, for example, have persistently attacked innocent Jews in horrific acts—so much so that recently 250 French intellectuals, politicians, and even former presidents banded together to demand action against this absurd violence and anti-Semitism. Similar acts of evil have taken place all over the world. This has been greatly exacerbated by the recent influx of Muslim refugees to the West, as admitted by Germany’s chancellor Angel Merkel who recently stated: “We have refugees now… or people of Arab origin, who bring a different type of anti-Semitism into the country…”

In 2017, Swedish police admitted that there are at least 23 “no-go” Sharia Law zones in their country.

It is important to note that when Scripture speaks of the End of Days, it is not describing a regional conflict, but an international one. The House of Ishmael is not a local threat to Israel alone, or only to Jewish communities, but to the entire globe. Every continent has felt the wrath of Islamist terrorism, and whole communities in England, France, and even America have become cordoned off as “sharia law” zones. Ishmael is even a threat to himself. Muslims kill each other far more than they kill non-Muslims. In 2011, the National Counter-Terrorism Center reported that between 82% and 97% of all Islamist terror victims are actually Muslim. All but three civil wars between 2011 and 2014 were in Muslim countries, and all six civil wars that raged in 2012 were in Muslim countries. In 2013, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom showed that 10 of the 15 most intolerant and oppressive states in the world were Muslim ones.

The Torah wasn’t wrong when it prophesied (Genesis 16:12) that Ishmael would be a “wild man; his hand against every man, and every man’s hand against him, and upon all of his brothers he will dwell.” Every Jew—and every human being for that matter—is experiencing an Ishmaelite exile at present.

The Exile Within

There is one more way of looking at the four exiles: not as specific nations under whom we were once oppressed, but as four oppressive forces that have always constrained Israel, and continue to do so today. These are the four root issues plaguing the Jews, and keeping us in “exile” mode.

The first is Edom, that spirit of materialism and physicality embodied by Esau. Unfortunately, such greed and gluttony has infiltrated just about every Jewish community, including those that see themselves as the most spiritual. The second, Bavel, literally means “confusion”, that inexplicable madness within the Jewish nation; the incessant infighting, the divisiveness, and the sinat chinam. Yavan is Hellenism, or secularism. In Hebrew, the word for a secular Jew is hiloni, literally a “Hellene”. Just as this week’s parasha clearly elucidates, abandoning the Torah is a root cause of many ills that befall the Jews. Finally, there is Paras. It was because the Jews had assimilated in ancient Persia that the events of Purim came about. Paras represents that persistent problem of assimilation.

It is important to point out that assimilation is different from secularism. There are plenty of secular Jews that are also very proud Jews. They openly sport a magen David around their neck, worry every day about Israel, want their kids to marry only other Jews, and though they don’t want to be religious, still try to connect to their heritage, language, and traditions. The assimilated Jew is not that secular Jew, but the one that no longer cares about their Jewish identity. It is the Jew that entirely leaves the fold. Sometimes, it is the one that becomes a “self-hating” Jew, or converts to another religion. Such Jews have been particularly devastating to the nation, and often caused tremendous grief. Some of the worst Spanish inquisitors were Jewish converts to Catholicism. Karl Marx and the Soviet Communists that followed are more recent tragedies. Not only do they leave their own people behind, they bring untold suffering to their former compatriots.

While there may be literal Babylonians, Persians, Greeks, and Edomites out there, the bigger problem for the Jewish people is the spiritual Bavel, Paras, Yavan, and Edom that infects the hearts and minds of the nation: infighting, assimilation, secularism, materialism. It is these issues that we should be spending the most time meditating upon, and expending the most effort to solve. Only when we put these problems behind us can we expect to see the long-awaited end to exile.

The Spiritual Significance of Israel Turning 70

This week we commemorate Yom Ha’Atzmaut, the State of Israel’s Independence Day, marking seventy years since its founding. Although the State is certainly far from perfect, its establishment and continued existence is without a doubt one of the greatest developments in Jewish history. Many have seen it as the first steps towards the final redemption, and even among Haredi rabbis (which are generally opposed to the secular State) there were those who bravely admitted Israel’s significance and validity. Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach (1910-1995), for example, considered the State as Malkhut Israel, a valid Jewish “kingdom”—at least for halakhic purposes—while the recently deceased Rav Shteinman unceasingly supported the Nachal Haredi religious IDF unit despite the great deal of controversy it brought him. Rav Ovadia Yosef permitted saying Hallel without a blessing on Yom Ha’Atzmaut, and some have even composed an Al HaNissim text to be recited. While we have already written in the past about the significance of the State’s founding (along with one perspective to bridge together the secular and the religious on this issue), there is something particularly special about Israel’s 70th birthday.

Al HaNissim for the Amidah and Birkat HaMazon provided by Rav David Bar-Hayim of Machon Shilo

The number 70 holds tremendous significance in Judaism. It is the number of root languages and root nations in the world (with Israel traditionally described as “a sheep among seventy wolves”). It is the number of Jacob’s family that descended to Egypt and from whom sprung up the entire nation. The number of elders that assisted Moses, and parallel to them the number of sages that sat on the Sanhedrin. Although Moses lived 120 years, he wrote in his psalm that 70 years is considered a complete lifespan (Psalms 90:10), and King David, who put the final edit on that psalm and incorporated it into his book, lived precisely 70 years. As is well-known, David was granted those 70 years by Adam, which is why the Torah says Adam lived 930 years instead of the expected 1000 years. (See here for how he may have been able to live so long.)

The Arizal taught that Adam (אדם) stands for Adam, David, and Mashiach, for the final redeemer is both a reflection of the first man, and the scion of David. More amazingly, as we wrote earlier this year it is said that David is literally the middle-point in history between Adam and Mashiach, and as such, if one counts the years elapsed between Adam and David then it is possible to find the start of the messianic era—which just happens to be our current year 5778. In this year, the State of Israel itself turns 70, and our Sages speak of “seventy cries of the soul during labour”, and parallel to these, “seventy cries of the birthpangs of Mashiach”. It is possible to interpret these seventy birthpangs preceding the arrival of the messiah as the seventy years leading up to the redemption. Thus, Israel’s seventy years potentially bear great significance.

Just as Psalms says that seventy years is one complete lifespan, for the State of Israel these past seventy years can be likened to the end of one “lifetime”, with Israel now standing at the cusp of a new era. Indeed, with all that has happened in the Middle East in recent years and months, Israel has undoubtedly emerged stronger and more secure than ever before. In this seventieth year, the world has begun to recognize Israel’s permanence, and affirm its unwavering right to Jerusalem the Eternal. We see more and more nations formally recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s rightful capital, and the United States plans to open its new Jerusalem embassy on May 14, which is Yom Ha’Atzmaut according to the secular calendar.

These seemingly disparate points—David’s seventy years, the completion of Israel’s first seventy year lifespan, and the recognition of Jerusalem—are actually intricately connected, for it was King David who established the first official, unified, Jewish state in the Holy Land, with Jerusalem as its capital. In fact, David’s kingdom was the only fully independent, unified Jewish state until the modern State of Israel! (Other Jewish entities, including the Maccabean and Herodian, were essentially always vassals to some greater power like Greece or Rome.) It is therefore quite fitting that the State of Israel has the Star of David on its flag, and it is this Davidic symbol that has become emblematic of not just Israel itself but all of modern Judaism.*

Living Prophecy

Perhaps the most famous seventy in Scripture is the seventy year period of exile in Babylon, between the First and Second Temples. It is said that God decreed a seventy year exile in particular because Israel failed to keep seventy Sabbatical and Jubilee years between the settling of Israel under Joshua and the destruction of the First Temple. While the Exile was certainly a “punishment”, we know that God never truly “punishes” Israel, and out of each devastation (which is nothing more than a just measure-for-measure retribution) emerges something greater.

As we’ve written before, it is in Babylon that the vibrant Judaism that we know was born. (See ‘The First Jewish Holiday’ in Garments of Light.)  Unable to journey to the Temple, the Sages reworked each holiday to become more than a pilgrimage; unable to offer sacrifices, the Sages established prayers instead, “paying the cows with our lips” (Hosea 14:3); unable to fulfil the many agricultural laws, the Sages taught that learning the laws was as good as observing them. The Judaism of study, prayer, and mysticism was born out of the difficulty of the seventy-year Babylonian Exile. These past seventy years for Israel—also of great difficulty, and coming on the heels of another great devastation—was similarly one where Judaism has evolved considerably, and instead of dying out as some feared, has actually flourished.

Many have pointed out another modern “Babylonian Exile”, too. This is the communist regime of the Soviet Union, where millions of Jews were trapped for some seventy years. (The officially accepted start and end dates for the USSR are December 30, 1922 to December 26, 1991.) The histories of Russia and Israel are tightly bound, for many of Israel’s founders came directly from the Russian Empire, including Ze’ev Jabotinsky, Golda Meir, and the Netanyahus. Some even argue that the severe persecution by the Russians—unrivaled until the Nazis—is what gave the greatest motivation for the founding of Israel. The Kishinev Pogrom of 1903 was the final straw for the Zionists. The description of that pogrom by Bialik (another Russian Jew, and later Israel’s national poet) aroused the masses to take up the call and make aliyah, and convinced many more of the necessity of an independent Jewish state.

Russia’s involvement is all the more significant when we consider the possibility of Moscow as the prophesied “Third Rome”. As explored in the past, the “Red Army” headquartered in Moscow’s Red Square brings to mind the villainous Edom. Just as Rabbi Yose ben Kisma taught long ago in the Talmud (Sanhedrin 98a-b) that Mashiach will come when Rome/Edom falls for the third time, and there will not be a fourth, the Russian monk Filofey of Pskov (1465-1542) wrote of Moscow that “Two Romes have fallen, the third stands, and there will be no fourth.” This is all the more interesting in light of what we see in the news today about the growing conflict between the West and the Russia-Syria-Iran axis. It is important to keep in mind that Iran (Paras or Persia) is explicitly mentioned in Ezekiel’s prophecy of the great wars of the End of Days, the wars referred to as Gog u’Magog. The Midrash (Yalkut Shimoni on Isaiah 60, siman 499) comments on this that

In the year that Mashiach will be revealed, all the kings of the nations of the world will provoke each other. The king of Persia will threaten the king of Arabia, and the king of Arabia will go to Aram for advice. The king of Persia will then destroy the world, and all the nations will tremble and fall upon their faces, and they will be grasped by birthpangs like the birthpangs of labour, and Israel, too, will tremble and falter, and they will ask: “Where will we go?” And [God] will answer: “My children, do not fear, for all that I have done, I have done for you… the time of your salvation has come.”

Those who follow geopolitics will immediately identify this midrashic passage with current events. The war in Syria is very much a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran, just as is the war currently raging in Yemen. Saudi Arabia has joined the Western (Aram?) camp, and has even begun to speak positively of Israel in public. The prophet Jeremiah (49:27) further details that Syria will be the epicenter of the war, and the “end” will come when Damascus has fallen. Amazingly, Jeremiah calls the king of Damascus Ben Hadad (בן הדד), the gematria of which happens to equal Assad (אסד). And it also happens that the value of Gog u’Magog (גוג ומגוג) is 70.

Top right: Arab Coalition forces led by Saudi Arabia (and backed by the US, UK, and France) fighting in Yemen to defeat Iran-backed Houthi rebels. Bottom right: Today in the news we read about Saudi Arabia considering sending ground forces into Syria, where Iranian Revolutionary Guards are deeply entrenched. Some say Saudi Arabia secretly has forces in Syria already. It is highly likely that there are Russian and American paramilitary groups in Syria as well. Turkish and Israeli forces are heavily involved, too, and the US, UK, and France recently launched a missile strike on Syrian facilities.

Thus, Israel turning 70 carries remarkable symbolic meaning. The Midrash states that Israel has 70 names, and these correspond to the 70 names of the Torah (and the Torah’s 70 layers of meaning, to be revealed in full with Mashiach’s coming), as well as the 70 Names of God, and the 70 names for the holy city of Jerusalem. The last of these names, the Midrash says (based on Isaiah 62:2), is “a new name that God will reveal in the End of Days.” The struggle over Jerusalem and the Holy Land will soon end, with a new city and a new name to be reborn in its place.

May we merit to see it soon.

Courtesy: Temple Institute

*Judaism began with Abraham. In an amazing “coincidence” of numbers, Jewish tradition holds that Abraham was born in the Hebrew year 1948. The State of Israel was, of course, born in the secular year 1948. Jewish tradition also holds that Abraham was 70 years old at the “Covenant Between the Parts”, when God officially appointed Abraham as His chosen one. This means the Covenant took place in the Jewish year 2018, paralleling Israel’s 70th birthday in this secular year of 2018.