Parshat Shlach: The Time for Grasshoppers Is Over

The tragedy of the Meraglim did not begin with a lie. That is part of what makes the story so frightening.

When the spies returned from Eretz Yisrael, much of what they said was factually true. The land was powerful. The cities were fortified. The inhabitants were formidable. They had seen real danger, and they reported it. But then the report changed. It became interpretation. It became fear and smelled of defeat.

The turning point comes near the end of their words:

וַנְּהִי בְעֵינֵינוּ כַּחֲגָבִים וְכֵן הָיִינוּ בְּעֵינֵיהֶם

“We were in our own eyes like grasshoppers, and so we were in their eyes.”

Famously, the Kotzker Rebbe is said to have asked: it is bad enough that you were like grasshoppers in your own eyes — but what business is it of yours what you were in their eyes?

That question exposes the depth of the failure. The spies did not merely fear the giants. They allowed the imagined gaze of the giants to define them. They looked at themselves through the eyes of the people they were supposed to confront. Once that happened, the battle was already lost.

A person can face danger and still have courage. A nation can recognize difficulty and still move forward. But when a person begins to see himself through the contempt of his opponent, his strength collapses from within. The problem is no longer the enemy’s size. The problem is his own smallness.

This is why the report of the Meraglim was so destructive. They did not simply say, “The challenge is great.” They said, “We are small.” They did not merely describe giants. They turned the hostile eyes of others into the mirror in which they saw themselves.

That weakness led quickly to despair. If we are grasshoppers, then we cannot enter the Land: we should never have left Egypt. That is how spiritual collapse works. It begins with fear, but it ends by rewriting the entire past.

Faith does not mean there are no giants.
Faith means the giants are not the measure of who we are.

The lesson is painfully current.

The Jewish people today also live under the gaze of others. Every action is judged. Every act of self-defense is placed before the court of world opinion, often by people who showed little moral clarity when Jewish blood was spilled, Jewish families were shattered, and Jewish hostages were dragged into darkness.

Of course, we must act with morality. Torah never gives us permission to become cruel. But morality is one thing, and dependence on the approval of hostile nations is another. There is a deep difference between asking, “What does Hashem demand of us?” and asking, “How will those who hate us describe us?”

The Meraglim teach us that the second question can become poisonous.

A recent example was the uproar over Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and the detained flotilla activists. These were not innocent tourists who wandered into the wrong harbor. They came as part of a deliberate political provocation, to embarrass Israel and feed the world another image of Jewish guilt. They came to shout “Free Palestine,” to portray Israel as cruel, with little concern for Jewish blood, Jewish hostages, Jewish families, and Jewish survival.

Then Ben-Gvir appeared before them with an Israeli flag. Hatikvah was played. Their chants were stopped. They were made to understand that they had not arrived in a powerless country, but in the sovereign State of Israel.

A proud nation does not collapse in shame because anti-Israel activists discovered that Israel has a flag, an anthem, and a backbone

Was it everyone’s style? No. Was it delicate? No. Could one debate the optics or the tone? Certainly. But the wave of Jewish outrage that followed was itself revealing. We were told that all decent Jews should feel embarrassed. We were told that this was shameful, disgraceful, reprehensible, “not the Jewish way.”

Well, boo hoo.

What exactly was the great moral catastrophe? They were not beaten nor tortured. They were not innocent bystanders being humiliated for no reason. They came to provoke the Jewish state, and they were forced to confront the fact that the Jewish state is not required to bow its head before them.

If they felt humiliated, cry me a river.

A proud nation does not collapse in shame because anti-Israel activists discovered that Israel has a flag, an anthem, and a backbone. A proud nation does not apologize for refusing to let hostile provocateurs turn its ports, soldiers, and sovereignty into theater for the world’s condemnation. A proud nation can insist on humane conduct and still say, without apology, that those who come to weaken us, accuse us, and deny our rights have no claim on our national self-respect.

This is not cruelty. This is not moral blindness.
This is the refusal to live as grasshoppers.

The same issue appears, in a different and more painful way, inside Israeli society itself. Since October 7, tens of thousands of reserve soldiers, including many religious men,  have left homes, wives, children, jobs, and ordinary life to carry the burden of defending the Jewish people. Families have lived with uncertainty, fear, exhaustion, grief, and absence. The country sees this. The country feels this. And the country has largely run out of patience with a situation in which so many demand to play no role in national defense while still expecting the rest of society to carry the military, economic, and emotional burden.

But here too, the deeper problem is fear.

The leaders of Haredi society have been afraid to engage in a serious, honest conversation with the army and the government about how Haredim can participate in national service while remaining fully faithful to Torah, mitzvos, kashrus, tefillah, and their own religious standards. Everyone knows that there are thousands of young men who are not truly learning full-time. Everyone knows that the Haredi community is growing rapidly and will be an increasingly large part of Israel’s future. Everyone knows that something must change.

Yet the conversation is often trapped in old fears: if we enter the army, we will be destroyed; if we participate, our children will be pulled away; if we compromise at all, everything will collapse. These fears may have roots in real concerns, but fear cannot be allowed to become the permanent policy of a growing part of the Jewish people.

This is not a call to empty the batei midrash. A Jewish state should have room for genuine talmidei chachamim whose lives are fully dedicated to Torah. Their learning is precious, and it is part of the strength of Klal Yisrael. But that cannot justify a system in which everyone is treated as if he is learning day and night, when everyone knows that many are not. Courage and vision would mean building serious frameworks for those who are not full-time scholars — frameworks that allow them to serve the nation without being asked to abandon who they are.

It is a question of will. It is a question of leadership. It is a question of whether we are capable of thinking larger than the fears of the past.

This too is part of the failure of the Meraglim. They saw danger and concluded that the future was impossible. They took a real concern and turned it into paralysis. But Jewish leadership cannot be built on paralysis. It must be built on faith, responsibility, and courage.

This is especially important in our generation

For many centuries, the Jew in Golus often had no choice but to keep his head down. He lived under foreign rule, dependent on the goodwill of others, often tolerated but rarely secure. The instinct to be careful, quiet, and cautious was not cowardice. Often, it was survival.

But we are not living in that same historical moment.

We have not yet reached the final redemption. Mashiach has not yet come. The world is still broken, Jewish suffering has not disappeared, and we still await the day when Hashem’s presence will be fully revealed. But neither are we the powerless Jew of the dark galus. Hashem has granted us the unbelievable privilege of living in a time of Jewish return, Jewish sovereignty, Jewish defense, and Jewish rebuilding. We have the State of Israel. We have a strong army. We have a flourishing world of Torah. We have seen Jewish life rise again and return to its Land with strength, creativity, courage, and faith.

That is what I have called the Isaac Covenant: the stage of Jewish history in which we are no longer merely surviving as wandering strangers, but beginning to live again as a rooted people in our Land. Yitzchak Avinu does not wander in the same way as Yaakov. He digs wells. He plants. He remains in the Land. He represents the covenant of rootedness, continuity, and strength within Eretz Yisrael.

That covenant brings responsibility. It demands that we stop thinking like fugitives when Hashem has given us the tools of nationhood. It demands that we stop apologizing for existing, stop apologizing for defending ourselves, and stop apologizing for having a flag, an army, and a country.

No, this does not mean triumphalism. It does not mean that every policy is correct or that every leader is beyond criticism. It does not mean that Jewish power is automatically holy. Power must be guided by Torah, by wisdom, by restraint, and by moral seriousness.

But it does mean that Jewish weakness is not a virtue. Fear is not humility. Self-erasure is not morality. And the habit of seeing ourselves through the contempt of others is not the Jewish way.

Against the collapse of the Meraglim stood Calev. He did not deny the facts. He did not pretend there were no giants. He said:

עָלֹה נַעֲלֶה וְיָרַשְׁנוּ אֹתָהּ כִּי יָכוֹל נוּכַל לָהּ

“We shall surely go up and inherit it, for we can surely do it.”

Calev did not speak the language of fantasy. He spoke the language of faith. Faith does not mean that there are no giants. Faith means that the giants are not the measure of who we are.

The Jewish people need morality, but we also need pride. We need compassion, but we also need courage. We need to care deeply about what Hashem demands of us, but we must stop trembling before the eyes of those who despise us.

A Jew may not be cruel. But a Jew may stand tall. A Jewish state may not abandon its conscience. But it also may not abandon its backbone.

The time for grasshoppers is over

We are not yet at the end of history. We still await the final redemption. But Hashem has brought us into a new chapter, and we must have the courage to live in it. We must act with dignity, strength, and faith. We must defend Jewish life without apology. We must honor those who carry the burden. We must demand responsibility from all parts of the nation. And above all, we must stop asking, “How are we in their eyes?”

The only eyes that can define us are the eyes of Hashem.

Parshas Beha’aloscha: Bringing Kedusha Home

There is a striking shift in Sefer Bamidbar.

For much of the beginning of the sefer, everything appears ordered, dignified, and full of promise. Klal Yisrael has left Mitzrayim, received the Torah at Har Sinai, survived the debacle of the Golden Calf, and built the Mishkan. Each shevet has been counted and has taken its place around the Mishkan with its own flag and renewed sense of purpose. The Leviim are counted and prepared for their sacred role. The trumpets sound, the camp begins to travel, and the nation seems ready to move forward toward its future in Eretz Yisrael.

Then come the upside-down nuns, framing the familiar words of “Vayehi Binsoa Ha’Aron,” and suddenly the tone changes. The journey that had begun with such promise starts to unravel. The people complain. They grumble. They long for the watermelons and onions they imagine enjoying in the “good old days” of Mitzrayim. Moshe Rabbeinu reaches a point of anguish and cries out that he can no longer carry the burden alone. The people gorge themselves on quail, and many die. Soon afterward comes the painful episode of Miriam, followed in the next parsha by the tragedy of the Meraglim.

What happened?

On the surface, the complaints are about food, discomfort, and the hardships of travel. But the Torah often asks us to listen beneath the surface. When complaints become constant, there is usually something deeper taking place. The words people use are not always the whole story. Sometimes the frustration we hear is only the outer layer of a more painful sense of loss.

One of the major transitions taking place in these parshios is the replacement of the Bechoros by the Leviim. The Torah states this explicitly in Parshas Beha’aloscha:

כִּי לִי כׇל־בְּכוֹר בִּבְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל בָּאָדָם וּבַבְּהֵמָה בְּיוֹם הַכֹּתִי כׇל־בְּכוֹר בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם הִקְדַּשְׁתִּי אֹתָם לִי׃
וָאֶקַּח אֶת־הַלְוִיִּם תַּחַת כׇּל־בְּכוֹר בִּבְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל׃

“For every firstborn among Bnei Yisrael is Mine, among man and animal; on the day I struck every firstborn in the land of Egypt, I sanctified them to Me. And I took the Leviim in place of every firstborn among Bnei Yisrael.”

Originally, the Bechoros carried a special kedusha. They were sanctified at the time of Yetzias Mitzrayim, when Hashem struck the firstborn of Egypt and spared the firstborn of Klal Yisrael. Before the Mishkan was established, the Bechoros were associated with bringing korbanos and serving Hashem in a unique way. They were, in a sense, the spiritual representatives within each family.

That model is very significant. Kedusha was not meant to be limited to one central institution or to one special group. Every family was meant to have within it a representative of holiness. Every home was meant to include someone who embodied a higher calling. The sacred was not meant to live only in a distant sanctuary. It was meant to be woven into family life itself.

But then came the Eigel HaZahav.

Rashi explains that the Bechoros had originally belonged to Hashem, but “טעו בעגל” — they erred with the Eigel. At the moment of crisis, when Moshe Rabbeinu called out, “Mi LaHashem Elai — whoever is for Hashem, come to me,” it was Shevet Levi that stepped forward. The Bechoros, who had been entrusted with a special spiritual role, did not rise to the moment in the same way. From that point onward, the Leviim took their place.

The Sforno adds a powerful layer. He explains that the firstborn of Mitzrayim were struck because they were the most honored members of society. They were the ones others looked up to, and therefore the responsibility of the nation rested upon them. They should have protested. They should have led. They should have used their stature to resist evil.

Although Am Yisrael had also sunk to the forty-ninth level of tumah, to the point that the angels famously wondered why they were more worthy of being saved than the Egyptians, the Bechoros of Klal Yisrael were nevertheless spared and sanctified. But that sanctity came with responsibility. According to the Sforno, they were initially made holy in a way that would have removed them from ordinary work entirely, much like the firstborn animal is restricted from ordinary use. At the same time, Hashem commanded that they be redeemed, allowing them to return to ordinary life.

In other words, the Bechor is redeemed, but not simply ordinary. He is padui, redeemed, and yet still marked by kedusha. He returns to the world of family life, business, and daily human activity, but he is meant to carry a memory of holiness into that world. His kedusha is not erased. It is transformed into a mission.

This is a remarkable idea. The original ideal was not that the holy person should be detached from the family. It was that every family should have holiness within it. Every home should contain someone whose life reminds the family that a Jewish home is not merely a private household. It is a place where Hashem’s presence can dwell.

After the Eigel, however, that model changed. The Bechoros lost their role, and the Leviim were chosen in their place.

This may help us understand the emotional undercurrent of Sefer Bamidbar. The Bechoros did not merely lose an honor; they lost a mission. A role that had once belonged inside every family was now transferred to one shevet. Avodas Hashem became more centralized. The Mishkan stood at the center, and the Leviim surrounded it as its guardians and servants.

Of course, this was necessary. After the failure of the Eigel, Klal Yisrael needed structure, boundaries, and a more protected form of avodah. But something was also lost. The ideal had been that every home should contain its own point of kedusha, its own living reminder that Jewish life is meant to be elevated from within.

Perhaps this is part of what lies beneath the grumbling in Beha’aloscha. The people complain about this and about that, but underneath there is a deeper discomfort. They are struggling with displacement. They are struggling with a new reality in which some have been moved aside, others elevated, and the original dream has been diminished.

The tragedy is that instead of asking, “What did we lose, and how can we grow from it?” they asked, “Why were we pushed away?” Instead of reflecting on what led to the change, they complained about the change itself.

That mistake is painfully human. When we lose a position, an opportunity, a role, or a sense of importance, our first instinct is often to focus on the pain of displacement. We wonder why someone else was chosen. We feel overlooked. We feel the sting of no longer being needed in the same way. But the deeper question is not only, “Why did this happen to me?” The deeper question is, “What is Hashem asking of me now?”

The story of the Bechoros and Leviim is not only about ancient roles in the desert. It is about the ongoing challenge of bringing kedusha into real life. The formal centers of holiness are essential: the shul, the beis midrash, the yeshiva, the places where Torah and tefillah are protected and nurtured. But they were never meant to replace the Jewish home.

The sacred was not meant to live only in a distant sanctuary. It was meant to be woven into family life itself

The home remains the place where kedusha is tested most honestly. It is in the home that patience is practiced. It is in the home that children learn what matters. It is in the home that Shabbos is felt, not merely observed. It is in the home that Torah becomes tone, warmth, discipline, language, and memory. A person may be inspired in shul, but the question is whether that inspiration comes home with him.

This is one of the beautiful messages that emerges from the idea of the Bechoros. They represented kedusha inside the family circle. They symbolized the possibility that every Jewish home could have someone who carries the mission, someone who reminds the family that life is meant to be lifted.

In a broader sense, that responsibility does not belong only to a literal firstborn. Every person can become that presence in a home. Every parent, child, sibling, or grandparent can be the one who brings more patience, more Torah, more dignity, more emunah, and more sensitivity into the family.

Moshe Rabbeinu expresses this ideal powerfully later in the parsha. When Eldad and Meidad prophesy in the camp, Yehoshua is disturbed. But Moshe responds, “Would that the entire people of Hashem could be prophets.” Moshe does not want holiness to remain limited to the few. His dream is that the spirit of Hashem should rest upon everyone.

That is the ultimate vision: not a Judaism where kedusha is confined to official spaces and official people, but a Judaism where the presence of Hashem is felt throughout the camp, and especially in the home.

A few parshiyot earlier, in the vision of a blessed future of Parshas Bechukosai, the Torah described this dream with the words:

וְהִתְהַלַּכְתִּי בְּתוֹכְכֶם — “I will walk among you.”

Walking together is not about reaching a destination. It is like taking a stroll after the chulent. It is about closeness, companionship, and a life in which Hashem is not distant, but present.

That remains our avodah.

The Mishkan stood in the middle of the camp. But the goal was always that its light should reach every home

We may not have the Mishkan today. We may not have the Leviim singing in the Beis Hamikdash. We may not fully understand how the roles of Leviim and Bechoros will be restored in the future. But we do know this: the dream of kedusha in the home has never disappeared.

A Jewish home can be a place of holiness. A Shabbos table can be a place of avodah. A conversation can be a place of Torah. A parent’s patience, a child’s respect, a word of encouragement, a moment of restraint — these too are ways of bringing Hashem into the camp.

The journey of Klal Yisrael in the midbar reminds us that spiritual greatness is not only measured by what happens at the center. It is also measured by what happens around it, in the tents, in the families, and in the ordinary spaces of life.

The Mishkan stood in the middle of the camp.

But the goal was always that its light should reach every home.

 

Printed in the Jewish Press  and the Queens Jewish Link, June 5, 2026

Bamidbar before Shavuot: What Do We Really Want?

There is a longstanding custom that Parshat Bamidbar is read on the Shabbat immediately preceding Shavuot. Various explanations are offered for this connection, but one of the most striking is also one of the simplest.

The Torah was given in a desert.

Not in a great city, not in a fertile or comfortable place, not in the center of civilization, but in a barren wilderness — a place empty of distraction, empty of security, empty of everything except the encounter between Klal Yisrael and the Ribbono Shel Olam.

Chazal see something deeply significant in that setting. Torah can only truly be acquired, they teach, by one who is willing to make himself like a Midbar — a place not crowded with competing obsessions and endless noise. The desert represents a stripping away of distractions, dependencies, and competing preoccupations, a willingness to stand exposed before something greater than oneself.

And perhaps, as we prepare for Shavuot, that raises an uncomfortable but necessary question: What do we really want?

Not what we officially believe in, or publicly identify with, or dutifully perform — but what actually occupies the center of our emotional lives? What are we moving toward instinctively, naturally, when no one is forcing us?

At the beginning of Parshat Bechukotai, the Torah speaks about blessing flowing from a life shaped by Torah. Rashi famously explains the phrase “Im Bechukosai Telechu” as “Sheteheyu Ameilim Batorah” — that we should labor in Torah.

This is not limited — as it is often understood in the classic yeshivish sense — to expending great intellectual effort to understand a difficult Tosfos. Indeed, a few lines later, Rashi explains that this labor exists “al menas lishmor u’lekayem” — in order to observe and fulfill the Torah. Torah is not meant merely to pass through the intellect. It is meant to shape the heart, the instincts, and ultimately the desires of a person.

From Obligation to Desire

There is a profound difference between doing something because we must and doing it because we are drawn toward it.

A person can daven because the halachah obligates him to daven, all the while glancing impatiently at the clock. Another person can approach tefillah as the most precious part of the day, as a chance to step away from the noise of life and stand before Hashem. Externally, they may appear to be doing the same thing. Internally, they are inhabiting completely different worlds.

The same is true of Torah itself. One person learns because that is what religious Jews are supposed to do. Another learns because Torah has become the place his soul naturally wants to go.

The Ohr HaChaim offers a remarkable insight into the words “Im bechukosai telechu.” He connects them to the verse in Tehillim in which David HaMelech says, “Chishavti derachai va’ashivah raglai el eidosecha” — “I considered my paths, and my feet returned me to Your testimonies.” Chazal describe David as sometimes believing he was headed elsewhere entirely, only to discover that his feet had instinctively carried him to the Beit Midrash.

It is a beautiful image. Torah had become so deeply woven into his being that it no longer felt external to him. It was not simply an obligation imposed from outside. It had become his natural gravitational pull.

Perhaps that is what Chazal mean by ameilus baTorah. Not merely working hard at Torah, but internalizing it so deeply that in everything one does, one’s inner world begins moving one toward Torah on its own.

And that brings us directly back to Shavuot.

We stay awake not because exhaustion is holy, but because longing is holy

One of the best-known customs of Shavuot is to remain awake throughout the night learning Torah. Chazal explain that this serves as a tikkun for the generation that stood at Har Sinai, who, according to the Midrash, went to sleep the night before Matan Torah and had to be awakened by Moshe Rabbeinu.

At first glance, the criticism seems difficult to understand. Human beings need sleep. Why is this viewed as a failing?

But perhaps the issue was not sleep itself. The issue was anticipation.

A kallah does not sleep indifferently the night before her wedding. There is excitement, longing, emotional readiness. One senses that something life-changing is about to occur.

And so every year, before we once again stand at Sinai, we attempt to demonstrate not merely commitment to Torah, but eagerness for Torah. We stay awake not because exhaustion is holy, but because longing is holy.

The tikkun of Shavuot is not merely to remain awake learning Torah through the night. It is to become the kind of Jews who cannot easily sleep because Torah matters to us that much.

This idea appears again in a different form in the story of the Meraglim.

The Maggid Meishorim, attributed to the Malach who regularly revealed himself to the Beit Yosef, asks a fascinating question. If Hashem had already promised Bnei Yisrael that Eretz Yisrael was good, why send spies at all? And why did Moshe instruct them to examine whether the country was good or bad, or whether the fruit was beautiful?

Had Hashem not already promised them, back in Egypt and repeatedly thereafter, that it was a beautiful and abundant land? What difference should any of that have made?

The mission of the meraglim was not to investigate Eretz Yisrael. It was meant to cultivate love for Eretz Yisrael.

The answer he suggested is profound. Moshe was not gathering military intelligence. He was trying to awaken longing. He was, as it were, winking at them: Go see what a wonderful land it is! See its beauty! Experience its goodness! I want you to return and speak about it in a way that will make the people yearn to enter it.

The mission of the meraglim was not to investigate Eretz Yisrael. It was meant to cultivate love for Eretz Yisrael.

And that, perhaps, was their deepest failure.

Rav Yissachar Shlomo Teichtal חי"ד developed this idea with extraordinary emotional force in Eim HaBonim Semeichah. Writing during the horrors of the Holocaust, after rethinking many of the assumptions with which he had grown up, Rav Teichtal returned again and again to one painful realization: Jews had become too comfortable in the Galut.

For centuries we prayed for Eretz Yisrael, cried over Eretz Yisrael, spoke passionately about Eretz Yisrael — yet our desire to return was often more theoretical than real, for we had grown too comfortable where we were to go there now.

He compared this to the generation that slept on the night before Matan Torah. If Chazal believed that a lack of visible anticipation for Torah required a tikkun for all generations, how much more so must we repair the failure to cultivate genuine longing for Eretz Yisrael.

His words are especially powerful because he himself never merited reaching the Land. He wrote with urgency, heartbreak, and longing, trying desperately to awaken Jews to the gift standing before them, but he was murdered before he could arrive.

Preparing for Shavuot Means Preparing the Heart

Perhaps that is part of what genuine preparation for Shavuot demands from us.

Not merely more learning, but deeper longing.

Parshat Bamidbar reminds us that the Torah was given in a wilderness, in a place stripped of distractions and competing loyalties. To receive Torah fully requires more than observance alone. It requires a willingness to let Torah become central — not merely something we fit into our lives, but something around which our lives begin to revolve.

The question, ultimately, is not only whether we are keeping Torah, but whether our hearts are moving toward it. Whether Torah has become a place to which we naturally gravitate; whether mitzvot feel merely obligatory or deeply precious; whether the things that are holy still occupy the center of our emotional lives.

Because the strongest and most enduring forms of Jewish life are rarely sustained by obligation alone. They are sustained by learning, slowly and sincerely, to desire the right things.

Lag BaOmer Is Over. So Why Are We Still Mourning?

 Lag BaOmer has come and gone.

The bonfires have burned out, the music has faded, and for a brief moment, the heavy customs of mourning that accompany the weeks of S’firas HaOmer lifted. Weddings resumed, haircuts were taken, and there was a palpable sense of relief.

And yet, for many communities, the mourning has now quietly returned.

Which raises a simple but surprisingly profound question: If Lag BaOmer marks the end of tragedy – if it commemorates the day when the talmidim of Rabbi Akiva stopped dying – then why do so many continue to observe mourning even after the day has passed?

The most straightforward answer is technical. Since the month of Nisan is a time of joy, during which mourning practices are avoided, some communities simply shift the 33 days of mourning to the period after Nisan. In that sense, what we are experiencing now is a kind of “make-up” period.

But that explanation, while correct, feels incomplete. It tells us how the calendar works, but not why this second custom took hold with such persistence and emotional weight, or why it was so important to have a full 33 days of mourning of those talmidim.

To understand that, we have to look beyond the familiar story of Rabbi Akiva’s students and consider another, less frequently discussed chapter of Jewish history – one that unfolded many centuries later, but left a mark deep enough to reshape our calendar.

During the First Crusade in 1096, Jewish communities across the Rhineland – cities like Speyer, Worms, and Mainz – were devastated. As the Crusaders made their way toward the Holy Land, they turned their fury on the Jewish populations they encountered along the way.

The choice they offered was brutally simple: Convert or die.

Entire communities chose to die.  Families gathered in synagogues. Parents and children stood together. And rather than abandon their faith, they accepted being burned to death al kiddush Hashem. These massacres took place specifically during the weeks of Iyar – the very period we are now in.

Their memory did not remain confined to historical record. It entered our liturgy, most notably in the t’filah of Av HaRachamim, recited on Shabbos, and in the Kinos of Tish’ah B’Av. And in certain communities, it reshaped the observance of S’firas HaOmer itself, giving rise to the custom of continued mourning after Lag BaOmer.

This introduces a striking contrast.

The deaths of Rabbi Akiva’s talmidim, as they are commonly understood, are often associated – at least in some traditions – with a moment of national struggle, possibly connected to the Bar Kochba revolt. That was a story of visible heroism: Jews fighting for independence, attempting to reclaim their place in history, even at enormous cost.  It was the last gasp of an attempt to fight for national independence, ending in a heroic but terrible disaster.

The Crusades tell a very different story.

There were no organized revolts, no armies rising in defiance. And yet, in their refusal to abandon their faith, those communities showed a courage no less real – only far less visible. It was the courage of endurance rather than action, of unwavering faith rather than open resistance.

People often celebrate one kind of heroism over another. Even in remembering the Holocaust, some chose to honor only those who fought back, while feeling embarrassed by those who “went like sheep to the slaughter.” They failed to see that many who did not resist made a conscious, heartbreaking choice: to avoid provoking even greater brutality, to stay with their terrified families rather than escape alone. Figures like Rav Elchonon Wasserman Hy”d embodied this quiet heroism, returning from America to stand with his students and community, helping them find the strength to face their fate together.

The fighter, the rebel, the one who takes up arms: that image is vivid, dramatic, easy to recognize. But Jewish history has never rested on a single form of strength.

The quiet decision to remain, to endure, to hold fast to one’s identity even in the face of certain death – that, too, is heroism, expressed in a different but no less profound way.

The quiet decision to remain, to endure, to hold fast to one’s identity even in the face of certain death – that, too, is heroism, expressed in a different but no less profound way.

And it is here that the figure most closely associated with Lag BaOmer – Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai – offers a deeper lens through which to understand both forms of courage.

The Gemara describes how, after years of elevated, secluded immersion in the deepest secrets of Torah, Rabbi Shimon emerged from the cave unable to tolerate the ordinary world. People engaged in mundane work – plowing, planting, earning a living – seemed to him to be missing the point entirely. His instinctive response was rejection.

But after returning to the cave and emerging once more, he saw something he had not been able to see before.

A simple Jew, running just before Shabbos, carrying two small bundles of myrtle: one for Zachor and one for Shamor.

This time, Rabbi Shimon did not dismiss him. He marveled: “See how beloved the mitzvos are to Israel.”

Nothing in the world outside had changed. What changed was the ability to see beneath the surface – to recognize the holiness embedded in the ordinary, the devotion expressed not in dramatic acts but in simple, faithful gestures.

Nothing in the world outside had changed. What changed was the ability to see beneath the surface

Perhaps that is the deeper meaning of this extended period of mourning.

Lag BaOmer does mark a turning point, but not an ending. It reminds us that Jewish history contains multiple layers – moments of visible struggle and moments of hidden greatness, acts of defiance and acts of quiet faith.

When some communities continue mourning beyond Lag BaOmer, they are not ignoring its message; they are expanding it.

They are reminding us that the story of the Jewish people cannot be reduced to a single narrative of strength. It includes the battlefield and the synagogue, the public act and the private sacrifice, the heroism that makes history and the heroism that sustains identity.

And perhaps, in a world that so often measures strength only by what can be seen, that is a message we still need to hear.

Lag BaOmer may be behind us. But what it teaches – about how to see, how to remember, and how to understand courage – is very much still unfolding.

Published in the May 6 edition of the Queens Jewish Link

The Issac Covenant: No Longer in the Jacob Exile

Behar–Bechukotai and the Meaning of Our Moment

In Parashat Behar–Bechukotai, we encounter one of the most sobering passages in the Torah—the Tochacha, the description of exile, suffering, and dislocation that has shaped so much of Jewish history. But suddenly, the Torah pivots from devastation to memory, from curse to covenant:

“Then will I remember My covenant with Yaakov; I will remember also My covenant with Yitzchak, and also My covenant with Avraham; and I will remember the land.” (Vayikra 26:42)

It is a familiar verse. But upon closer reflection, it is deeply puzzling.

Why the reverse order? Why begin with Yaakov and move backward to Avraham?

And why does the Torah speak of three separate covenants—“My covenant with Yaakov… My covenant with Yitzchak… My covenant with Avraham”—rather than presenting them as a single unified legacy?

Three Covenants

As Rav Hirsch explains, this is not merely a reference to three individuals, but to three distinct historical stages—three different modes through which the Jewish people live out their covenantal existence in the world.

For much of our history, we have lived in the world of Yaakov. It was a world defined by endurance: exile, vulnerability, and dependence on forces beyond our control. Like Yaakov preparing to meet Esav, we learned to navigate reality through a careful balance of prayer, diplomacy, and restraint. We bowed when necessary—not because we lacked dignity, but because survival demanded it. That long era forged a people of extraordinary spiritual resilience, a people who carried Torah through darkness with unwavering faith.

But the Torah in Bechukotai hints that this is not the final stage.

Between Yaakov and Avraham stands Yitzchak—often the least discussed of the Avot, but nevertheless the most relevant to us. Yitzchak’s life does not unfold in dramatic journeys or sweeping transformations. Instead, it takes place in a quieter but more complex reality. He is not celebrated like Avraham, but not beset with difficulties and torment like Yaakov. He is successful, prosperous, and firmly established—and at the same time, envied and resented.

It is difficult to ignore how precisely this reflects our present moment.

He builds, he plants, he develops—and again and again he is pushed back by those around him. He is told to leave because he has become too strong. His neighbors do not love him, but neither is he subject to them. And in the end, those same neighbors come to him and acknowledge what they cannot deny: that his success reflects something greater than himself.

Yitzchak is not embraced.  But yet he stands strong.

It is difficult to ignore how precisely this reflects our present moment.

For the first time in nearly two thousand years, the Jewish people are no longer merely surviving history—we are participating in it, shaping it in visible and consequential ways. The return to the Land of Israel, the establishment and defense of the State, the rebuilding of Torah life on an unprecedented scale both in Israel and the Diaspora, and the emergence of Jewish strength and influence throughout the world — all of this represents a fundamental shift in Jewish existence.

And yet, alongside this extraordinary blessing, something deeply familiar persists. The nations do not relate to us with the acceptance we might hope for. Instead, we encounter suspicion, criticism, and at times open hostility — often wildly disproportionate to reality. The more visible our success becomes, the more it seems to provoke reaction.

In recent months, as Israel has been forced once again to defend itself under intense global scrutiny, we have seen this pattern play out with striking clarity — military necessity met with moral accusation, self-defense recast as aggression, and a world quick to judge yet slow to understand.

This is not a contradiction. It The Age of Yitzchak.

A Different Kind of Exile Has Ended

One of the great dangers of our time is that we may continue to think and respond as though we are still living in the world of Yaakov. The instinct is understandable. It has been ingrained over centuries. If we explain ourselves better, soften our tone, and be sufficiently careful and conciliatory, perhaps we will be accepted. Perhaps the hostility will subside.

But both history and Torah suggest otherwise. The strategies of Yaakov were not mistakes — they were necessities. They allowed us to survive when survival itself was uncertain. But they were suited to a particular reality. To continue operating exclusively within that framework when the underlying conditions have changed is not humility — it is a failure to recognize the nature of the moment Hashem has placed us in.

It is true that within the Torah world, there have been different reactions and attitudes toward the State of Israel and toward contemporary events. Among the Gedolim and leaders, some have rejected any recognition of the State as a positive force in Jewish history. Others have embraced it as a great privilege, even as the beginning of redemption. Most have taken positions somewhere between those poles.  It is not my place to take sides in that debate.

But it is very clear that Rav Hirsch, at least, understood that a time would come in which the old patterns of Jewish response to the nations around us would no longer apply in the same way. He envisioned a stage in which the Jewish people would no longer be defined solely by weakness and exile, but would have to navigate a reality of relative strength, prosperity, and visibility—while remaining faithful to their unique mission.

Rav Hirsch was not a proponent of secular nationalism. But everything we know about his thought suggests that had he lived to see our time, he would have recognized that we have arrived—far more clearly than in his own nineteenth-century Germany—at the stage he described as the Covenant of Yitzchak. The limited opening of the ghettos in his day, which he cautiously interpreted as a possible transition, pales in comparison to the transformation we are witnessing now.

This recognition carries with it both privilege and responsibility.

The Covenant of Yitzchak is not a celebration of power for its own sake. Yitzchak’s strength is never detached from an awareness of its source. His success points beyond himself. That awareness is what defines him.

So too in our time. The ability of the Jewish people—and of the State of Israel—to endure, to defend itself, and at times to prevail against overwhelming odds is not merely a geopolitical fact. It reflects a level of Divine assistance that is difficult to ignore. To recognize that is not a retreat from strength—it is what gives that strength meaning.

At the same time, to ignore the responsibility that accompanies this moment would be equally problematic. For centuries, Jewish life was largely reactive. We responded to what was imposed upon us. Today, we are called upon to be proactive—to build, to shape, and to define what Jewish life looks like not only in private, but in the public sphere of history.
That is a far more demanding challenge.

The Courage to Live as Yitzchak

It requires not only faith, but confidence. Not only resilience, but clarity. It requires the ability to stand without apology, while remaining deeply aware that our strength is not independent of the One who sustains it.

The trajectory outlined in Bechukotai does not end with Yitzchak. It moves forward toward Avraham—a stage in which the Jewish people are not merely tolerated or even respected, but recognized as a source of blessing. That stage has not yet fully arrived. But the path toward it runs through the reality we are now living.

We are, it would seem, in the age of Yitzchak.

For those interested in exploring this idea more fully, I have written a series of essays developing what I have called the “Isaac Covenant,” tracing this theme through Torah sources and contemporary events (available on this blog, starting here).

To live in such a time is a privilege that previous generations could scarcely have imagined. To recognize it, to understand its demands, and to respond to it with both strength and humility—that is the challenge before us.

Even after the darkest chapters of exile, the covenant does not simply restore us to what we once were. It moves us forward, stage by stage, toward what we are meant to become.

Our task is to recognize where we stand—and to have the courage to stand there fully.

This article was published in the May 8, 2026 edition of the Jewish Press

Alone, or Set Apart? A National and Personal Dilemma

Reflections on Parshat Kedoshim and Yom HaAtzmaut

There is a word that appears several times in Tanach with a haunting, resonant power.

In last week’s Parasha, it describes the unsettling figure of an outcast: “Badad yeshev, michutz la’machaneh moshavo.” The metzora — often mistranslated as a leper — sits alone. Sent outside the camp, the metzora isn't just ritually "unclean." He is socially erased. He dwells in a forced vacuum, required to warn others to stay away.

At the beginning of Eicha, it describes a nation: “Eicha yashva badad ha’ir rabati am.” A city once teeming with life now sits — utterly alone.  Of all the horrors that happened to Jerusalem in its destruction, the first and foremost was that it is now "alone".

there is an ache of being set apart, of being kept at arm’s length by the rest of the world

At first glance, these two uses of badad feel worlds apart. One is a consequence of personal failing; the other is a collective tragedy. Yet, in a deeper sense, they map out the same raw human experience: the ache of being set apart, of being kept at arm’s length by the rest of the world.

In general, Badad, or being alone, is not a good place to be. The first time the words “not good” appear in the Torah is in the phrase Lo tov heyot ha’adam levado, “It is not good for man to be alone” (Bereishit 2:18). And yet, that same language of separation appears elsewhere in the Torah (Bamidbar 23), transformed into a praise and blessing: “Hen am levadad yishkon u’vagoyim lo yitchashav.” A nation that dwells alone, not counted among the nations.

Here, being "apart" isn't a punishment; it’s an identity. It is essential to who we are. We pride ourselves on living among the nations while retaining our separateness and uniqueness, with our own value system. In fact, we see this as a great positive. It is the essence of the repeated exhortation in this week’s Parshat Achrei Mos-Kedoshim—that we should strive to be Holy. According to Rashi’s famous comment, this means we should strive to be Perushim—separate. Separate from the ethics and values of the surrounding culture, following the instruction of the Torah to live with divine values.

However, the world has often looked at the separateness of the Jewish people through the same lens that Haman used: “There is a certain people, scattered and different... their laws are incompatible…” To the world, our distinctness often looks like defiance. Our difference is treated as a reason for alienation.

This year, as we approach Yom Ha’atzmaut, that tension isn't just a theological idea; it feels like a lived reality.

Israel today exists in a strange, jarring paradox. On one hand, we see military successes that would have seemed unimaginable just a short time ago. Threats—whether Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas, or other enemies—that loomed over us for decades have been dismantled with a precision that feels, to many, like an open miracle. Moreover, we have accomplished this while striving to act with moral restraint. We have fought a war under intense scrutiny, bending over backward (at times, to my mind, perhaps too much) and putting our own soldiers at risk to avoid unnecessary civilian casualties. We warn them to get out before bombing, only to find ourselves criticized by increasingly loud voices on both the right and left, accusing Israel of genocide and war crimes while supporting our enemies. At times, it can feel as though the walls are closing in and we are being cast as a pariah state.

The criticism isn't just coming from our enemies; it feels like it's coming from everywhere. We aren't just being debated; we are being pushed to the margins of the so-called "family of nations." As for our great friend, the United States, we must be incredibly grateful to Hashem for the leadership of President Trump, who, despite his many faults, proved to be a historic friend to Israel—particularly in his efforts to confront the accursed Iranian leadership. Nevertheless, there is growing concern about the post-Trump era. We see it on the Democratic side, with 40 senators voting this week to embargo Israel, and we see it increasingly on the right as well.

In a world that demands simple categories, there is less and less room for people who do not fit into them.

Even more painful is the fact that we cannot find a unified shelter within our own community. The Jewish world itself feels fractured. For many, Yom Ha’atzmaut is a moment of transcendent religious significance, a time for Hallel and great rejoicing. For others, particularly in the Haredi world, the day is ignored or even criticized with severity—viewed through a lens of antagonism toward the secular state.

We are living in a world that seems to be losing its center. Nuance has become a casualty. Conversations are no longer layered; they are flattened into slogans. The "middle ground"—the space for complexity and careful thought—is shrinking. In a world that demands simple categories, there is less and less room for people who do not fit into them.

In such a world, “middle of the roaders” such as myself find themselves standing in the uneasy space between these two poles.

There is a specific kind of loneliness—a badad of the soul—that comes when you can hear the truth in the arguments of both sides, yet find yourself unable to join either camp fully. When most people have moved to one extreme or the other, those who seek a nuanced, integrated path often end up sitting "outside the camp" of both groups. We celebrate the miracle, yet we carry the weight of the critique. We feel “aloneness" even when our own people surround us.

Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik famously began his work The Lonely Man of Faith with the stark words, “I am lonely.” He wasn't talking about a lack of friends. He was talking about the inherent loneliness of a person of faith — the realization that your deepest commitments might never be fully understood by the world around you. There is a loneliness that comes from being pushed away, and there is a loneliness that comes from being fundamentally different.

In this atmosphere, the line between badad and levadad starts to fray. We have to ask ourselves: Is this "aloneness" a rejection—or a calling? Is it the result of being cast out, or the inevitable price of standing for something?

This year, the world's silence makes that loneliness unmistakable. 

The metzora is alone because he lost his place in the community. But the Jewish people are levadad because we have a specific, separate purpose.

Yom Ha’atzmaut has always been a paradox. It celebrates our return to the stage of history—our right to stand as equals among the nations. But it also highlights just how lonely our path is. This year, the world's silence makes that loneliness unmistakable. And the ever-increasing divide between the Haredim and the rest of the citizenry is never more apparent than on Yom Ha’atzmaut. It is particularly jarring for people like myself who follow the shita of the Ponovezher Rav zt’l and Yibadel Lachaim Rav Yisroel Meir Lau, who emphasize that Hallel needs to be said as Hakaros Hatov, even while omitting the bracha because of halakhic considerations, while at the same time recognizing it is obvious that one does not say Tachanun. We treat the day with the joy and gravity that it deserves, while observing others treating it as a completely ordinary day, not even worthy of as much note as Purim Katan.

Perhaps we are being asked to re-read our situation. Perhaps what we are feeling isn't just badad—isolation imposed from the outside—but also a forced reawakening of levadad—the sanctity of a people that must stand alone.

Our tradition suggests that a time will come when we realize that our alliances are fragile and our "supports" are thin—and that, ultimately, we have no one to lean on but our Father in Heaven.

Our hearts go out on Yom HaZikaron to those living it on the front lines. To the soldiers who stand guard while the world looks away. To the families whose tables have a permanent, agonizingly empty chair. To the parents living in the "Badad" of 3:00 AM, worrying about their children’s fate, or worse. They are standing at the edge of the camp, literally and figuratively.

The word badad can mean exile and pain, but it can also be the threshold of a deeper understanding. The challenge this Yom Ha’atzmaut is not to deny the loneliness, but to elevate it. We are a nation that was never meant to be measured by the approval of the world or the simplicity of a political camp. If we find ourselves standing alone, it is because we are standing in a place where only the truth can survive. In a noisy, polarized, and crowded world, standing levadad—with our values intact and our faith unshaken—is the hardest path to walk. But it is the only one that leads us to the ultimate Geulah.

Published in the Jewish Press 4/22/2026

Chametz and Matzah Together: The Message of the Korban Todah for Our Time

Parshat Tzav, Pesach, and the Daf Yomi Moment

As we prepare for Pesach and remove chametz from our homes, Parshat Tzav presents us with a striking paradox. The Torah’s central offering of gratitude—the Korban Todah—is brought not with matzah alone, but with both chametz and matzah:

 “Al challot lechem chametz yakriv Korbano” (Vayikra 7:13).

At the very moment we are eliminating chametz from our lives, the Torah tells us that true thanksgiving requires it. And for many of us, we are not only encountering the Todah in the weekly parashah, but in Daf Yomi as well. These very sugyot—the structure of the Todah, its forty loaves, the balance between chametz and matzah—are being learned right now, giving this idea a second point of entry: not only through the parashah, but through the daily rhythm of learning.

For anyone preparing for Pesach, this combination is almost jarring. The very substance we are about to eliminate so carefully becomes part of the Torah’s central expression of gratitude.

But that tension is not incidental — it is the message.

A Rare Presence of Chametz

In fact, the korban todah is one of only two offerings in the entire Mikdash service that include chametz (the other being the shtei ha-lechem of Shavuot). Otherwise, the Beit HaMikdash is, in a sense, “Kosher L’Pesach” all year long; chametz is absolutely forbidden.

That makes the Todah all the more unusual. Here, chametz is not excluded—it is required.

Gratitude After Danger

Chazal define the context of the Todah with precision. The Gemara (Berachot 54b) teaches that four categories of people are obligated to give thanks: one who crosses the sea, one who travels through the desert, one who recovers from illness, and one who is released from imprisonment. These are not routine experiences. They are moments of real danger followed by real deliverance.

In the time of the Beit HaMikdash, such a person would bring a Korban Todah. Today, in its absence, that obligation is expressed through Birkat HaGomel, recited publicly after being saved from danger.
We thank Hashem constantly—in Modim within every Amidah. But HaGomel, like the Todah, is something more focused: a response to extraordinary danger and deliverance, to having passed through something that could have ended very differently.

Two States at Once

Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch explains that chametz and matzah represent two simultaneous dimensions of the human condition.

Chametz expresses the human being as he stands in the world—with expansion, capability, and a sense of independence, particularly after having been restrained by hardship. The dough rises; it takes on presence. It reflects a person who has emerged from constraint and now stands with stability and strength.

Matzah, by contrast, expresses the human being as he stands before Hashem—without expansion, without illusion, fully aware that everything he has is given. It is the bread of dependence, clarity, and humility.

The Korban Todah does not ask us to choose between these perspectives. It insists that we hold both at once.

Equal Substance, Balanced Awareness

This is not only an idea—it is built into the halachic structure of the offering itself. Although there are more matzah loaves than chametz loaves, the total amount of flour used for each is equal. The forms differ, but the substance is the same.

Because if one’s sense of independence outweighs one’s awareness of dependence, gratitude becomes arrogance. And if one’s awareness of dependence erases one’s sense of human dignity and strength, then one has not fully grasped the gift that Hashem has given.

True Todah lives in the tension.

I am capable—and I am completely reliant.

I act—and I am carried.

Pesach and What Comes After

This sheds light on the timing of Parshat Tzav just before Pesach. For one week, chametz disappears entirely, and we live only with matzah, immersing ourselves in the foundational truth that everything comes from Hashem.

But Pesach is not meant to eliminate chametz permanently. It is meant to recalibrate it.
When chametz returns, it is meant to return differently—not as ego, but as responsibility; not as independence detached from Hashem, but as independence infused with awareness.

The Korban Todah teaches us how to live that balance.

A Todah for Our Time

It is difficult not to feel how deeply this speaks to the reality we are living through now in Israel.

On the one hand, we are witnessing something extraordinary. Thousands of missiles have been launched toward us—from Iran, from Hezbollah—and the tiny level of destruction, relative to what could have been, is astonishing. Again and again, we experience a sense that we are being protected in ways that are hard to fully explain.

On the other hand, we are not living in a time of complete safety. Missiles do get through. This week in Arad and Dimona there were injuries and significant damage. Recently, in Beit Shemesh, lives were lost. The vulnerability is real, immediate, and painful.

And so we find ourselves holding two realities at once.

We feel strength, resilience, capability—the reality of chametz.
And we feel dependence, fragility, and the need for divine protection—the reality of matzah.

This is not a contradiction. It is the lived experience of Todah.

Samaria youth have seized the Iranian missile that fell in Peduel to be a piece of playground equipment.

Living the Todah

Without a Beit HaMikdash, we do not bring a Korban Todah. But we do respond.

We say Birkat HaGomel when we are saved from danger, just as Chazal established. And in recent weeks, many have taken upon themselves small but meaningful acts of gratitude—saying Mizmor leTodah after a warning siren ends without impact. In our own home as well, this has become a quiet but powerful response: not just relief, but acknowledgment.

Not just exhaling—but recognizing.

Toward Pesach

As we enter Pesach, we step into a world of pure matzah, a week that strips away illusion and reminds us with clarity where everything comes from.

And when chametz returns, we are meant to return with it—differently.

To act, to build, to stand strong in the world, while knowing with complete clarity:

Our strength is real—but it is given to us from Above.
Our independence is real—but it is divinely sustained.

And holding those two truths together—fully, honestly, and at the same time—is itself our Todah.

Have a Happy, Safe, and Kosher Pesach

Published in the Queens Jewish Link, March 26, 2026