Libi BaMizrach

This week I had the tragic privilege of delivering a hesped eulogizing my dear departed mother, Chaya Leah (Harriet) Oppenheimer of blessed memory, הריני כפרת משכבה, in front of her home in Bayit Vegan. Some people have asked me if I could write down what I said; here it is, [with some further reflection over the last few days of Shiva]: We have known this day was coming, and it was coming sooner rather than later, for some time now, as Mom became more and more ill. For the last few years, Mom has been in a slow but steady decline and suffered various health and hearing problems that made her life most difficult. While thinking about my mother's life, especially her final great act of chessed, I recalled a famous verse. When the elderly Boaz realized that Rus wanted to marry him and perpetuate the memory of her late husband, Boaz said: וַיֹּאמֶר בְּרוּכָה אַתְּ לַה' בִּתִּי הֵיטַבְתְּ חַסְדֵּךְ הָאַחֲרוֹן מִן הָרִאשׁוֹן לְבִלְתִּי לֶכֶת אַחֲרֵי הַבַּחוּרִים אִם דַּל וְאִם עָשִׁ...

As Rosh Hashana of this very strange year approaches, it is time for introspection and thinking of perhaps making some changes.  This unprecedented year, as has been endlessly commented upon, has been mostly a disaster.  We stand before Unetaneh Tokef once again and  – as never before in my lifetime  –  wonder who will live, who will die; will it be in a calamity, or a plague, or by trouble breathing … who will be at peace and who will be subject to riots.  How can we – how should we – pray differently; is that what is needed so that this coming year will be better? I find myself repeatedly saying that if we learned nothing else from the Coronavirus, it is that we really truly do not know.  We don’t know anything.  We do not know why things happen, and indeed what will happen or when or why.  All the great predictions made at the beginning of the pandemic lie broken before us.  Society around us is in tatters.  We really do not know...

Tisha B'Av is now behind us.  Despite all the hopes when Corona first hit that Mashiach was right around the corner, we mourned once again on Tisha B’Av.  We certainly have – once again – determined to do something about the primary cause of the destruction of the second Bais HaMikdash, i.e., שנאת חינם  Sinat Chinam (SC), usually translated as “baseless hatred”.  And yet, I must conclude that the problem of SC is worse than ever. What is SC?  Why would someone hate another baselessly?  Surely that is something only a psychopath would do. Ordinary people do not hate someone for no reason at all.  Three incidents that our Sages point to help us to understand. The first occurred about 100 years before the Churban, in 63 BCE.  The evil Hasmonean king ינאי ( Alexander Jannaeus )was gone. Righteous Queen Shlomzion Hamalka succeeded him and appointed her eldest son Hyrcanus II to succeed her.  This did not sit well with her younger son Aristobulus I...