Efraim My First Born

Yesterday was our son's brit.  He is our fourth child and our third boy.  We named him Efraim.  There were many reasons for this.  Aside from Efraim being the name of my step-father in law's father, who came to Israel in 1947 from Morocco, Efraim is also according to the Vilna Gaon, the foundation of Geulah. It is he that brings us home. He inspires us to come back and builds the foundation of the final Malchut.

Yehoshua was from Efraim and after it was Yehoshua that defeated Amalek so many years ago.  At the end of days Efraim or better said Malchut Efraim (for Efraim is a movement and a concept more than anything else) will defeat Amalek in order to pave the way for the one true Melech to finish the Malchut that Efraim began.

It seems we rest on the cusp of history, where the final phase of our prophets future tales become present and our dreams become reality.  There is a Haman once more and the Malchut Efraim has risen.  It has stood up despite its deficiencies from the ashes of the Holocaust of 70 years ago caused by that generation's Amalek. It will stand victorious, a kingdom without a king, with Jerusalem as it capital, the true "City Upon the Hill." Amalek will fall and the king will return.  After all the story has been told before.  Efraim is the leader, the one who is concerned for his brothers and Dawid is the king who rules upon all of them.

May our son and everyone else witness the complete fulfillment of our sages prophetic visions this year.

The Eighth...

Tonight is Zot Chanukah.  It is the Eighth, the point in time where reality meets the divine.  The Maharaal in Tiferet Yisrael likens the Torah  to the Eighth.  The Torah is divine and it is that with which we refine ourselves and the world around us.  In a sense it is this that the Hashmonaim were fighting about.  The Yavanim (Greeks) believed in only what they saw and could rationalize. They believed in an intellect unguided by revelation.  The Torah is beyond that, it  represents the fusion between the divine and the physical.  It is our brit with the Creator which forces us to draw the divine light into reality through out actions. We believe in "Moshe K'Bal Torah M'Sinai." K'Bal...Receive.

Zot Chanukah is the culmination of the increasing kedushah.  It is one beyond the completion of 7 and yet that moment of moving beyond the natural order is more than just a digit, it is one that is complete change.  Ultimately that is the idea behind Moshiach.  He is like us, flesh and blood, but he is beyond.  In a sense his anointment with oil is our anointment, for he is "the heart of the Am."  One moment we are a nation with a heart of stone and the next moment we are one with a heart of flesh.  Redemption is about moving from the seventh to the eight.  We are still here, the natural order is unchanged, but inner clarity is complete and beyond.

The Midrash says points out while Moshe was the seventh, it was David who was the eighth and it is David who will reign at the end.  More than complete, a fusion of the divine and physical, a clarity of our covenant, and renewal of our Kingdom.

Our Land

It has begun.  Our Land yearns for the truth bound up within it.  It's holiness is unbounded, unfurled in front of the world.  With each new hill that is settled, claimed, the ancient Israeli returns.  No force can stop it and no power can subdue it. The argument and fight between a government that weakens in the face of world pressure and denies true Zionist heroes a house has now witnessed the children born after Oslo come of age.  No more flowers and no more hugs.  These are the children who witnessed Amona and saw that they must steer a different course. Is there a surprise?  The government knocks down homes of Jewish patriots and pours money into the modern Plishtim, the nation that is not a nation.

There is a force that is rising.  It is angry and in pain.  This is the force of the Supernal Mashiach ben Yosef imbued in the Land and that has fallen asleep in recent years.  However, the ancient Israeli has awakened, anew, alive.  "Shake yourself free, rise from the dust..."

The Final Act
Meanwhile the Kingdom of Gog U Magog is coming.  It is positioning itself on the East Side of the Jordan.  This is the Land of Gilead, the home of Eliyahu HaNavi and well inside the Land of Israel. Yet the real Israel is rising.  Authentic in spirit, free of the idolatry of Liberal Democracy.  The world will come because they cannot handle a Nation who returns to its true roots and source and does not bow tot he Bavel of Globalism.

These false leaders and peacemakers are trying to stop the final revelation of the Creator's light that comes with the rebuilding of the Beit Hamikdash and anointing of our true king and the reestablishment of the Sanhedrin.

We must settle new hills and build more houses and not let those forces who seek to prevent the complete Geulah and the full realization of the Creator's countenance from doing so.

Solutions to Our Conflict

The Nation of Israel has returned to its Land, yet we have been afraid to extend full control over our rightful inheritance.  Why is that? Essentially we lack belief/emunah.  We have long ceased to nurture the inner fire of our redemptive spirit that so pushed the founders of our nascent State.  Whether they believed in a "religious" sense isn't the point, they understood they were part of a profound change in the situation of the Jewish people.  Our generation fails to grasp that we are also part of an amazing historical current, which is flowing to a more perfect world.  We have lost sense of this so much that we are willing to part with areas of our inheritance and give it away to those who lack an historical, just, and most importantly G-dly claim.  There can never really be a two state solution, because a two state solution posits that our Land can be divided, which it cannot.

Thankfully there are those pushing for more than just the same peace slogans, and are getting the idea of one indivisible united Israel out on the table.  We must prepare in our minds and souls for a new approach. For believers in our cause there is only one solution: The One State Solution.

Is It Really Falling Apart or Getting Better?

The world is moving closer to something big and in a sense we are in the middle of the big moment already. The the divine light of the Creator, which drives our reality and pushes history has brought us to this point and yet there is a confusion as the mask falls from the faceless ruler of evil.

There is a covering through nature of the truth.  In the past it has been concentrated in evil and despotic rulers and yet now it is far worse, it is the machine bureaucracy and empty superlatives highlighting the benefit of Western thought and Democracy. The people vote and feel they have a say and so the old grievances feel less and over all connection to true ideology and the divine root of existence wanes.

This faceless ruler (the Memshelet Zadon according to Rav Wolbe in Alei Shur) is falling and with it the many things we hold dear.  Our comfortable world views are not so comfortable and we feel that things are spiralling out of control as the forces of globalization are stalled and shown to be broken.  Despite all of this, we see things are getting better, especially in Israel.  We are progressing and building and growing.  Is it perfect, no, but we are on an upward trajectory.  This is a direction towards something perfect, divine and true hidden in the world and covered by the faceless evil now becoming passe. This sublime truth of existence, the divine light and stream of G-dly consciousness is being revealed by us. 

The fall of Malchut Gog u Magog is not pretty.  It isn't supposed to be, but it is happening much more mercifully than we thought it would and that is the puzzle. We have imagined the end for centuries and this in many ways doesn't fit and yet when we learn Tanach and Gemorah and of course the writings of HaRav Kook and the Vilna Gaon we see, what is happening is exactly the way it should be.

Ruling From Above

לד  וַיָּגָר אַבְרָהָם בְּאֶרֶץ פְּלִשְׁתִּים, יָמִים רַבִּים.  {פ}

34 And Avraham sojourned in the land of the Philistines many days. {P}

In the midst of the tension and euphoria of the pending release of Gilad Shalit I want to move beyond the pros and cons of the deal since it appears to be a done deal.  We have a problem as a Nation a sickness if you will.  In a sense we have been dwelling for far too long in our Land which in irony is the same land of the Plishtim for our Lands are one and the same.  By the Torah telling us Avraham dwelt in the Land of the Plishtim it was informing us that there are times when even in our land it is not truly ours.

These Plishtim both modern and in the past are nothing more than a non nation, a mix of outcasts masquerading as an ancient clan deserving of a home land here in our Land. Gilad Shalit represents all of us for he has dwelled in the "Land of the Plishtim for many days" as we all have.  Our Nation is bound in many ways to the Palestinian struggle.  We are stuck and submerged in the lies and falsehoods of our enemies.  We know that each member of Am Yisrael is a microcosm of the whole Nation and so Gilad Shalit suffered in captivity within Israel and yet within the Land of the Plishtim at the same time.  His release is our release.  His return home is our return home

Returning A Captive

The sages teach us that the returning of a Jewish captive is greater than all other mitzvot. It is a strange mitzvah, because by redeeming a captive we are in  sense rewarding those that put the captive there, no matter the price. Yet we go forward with it anyhow.  It is dangerous!  Many are saying.  Yes it is, but we are implored in the second to last siman in Hoshen Mishpat to risk our lives to save our fellow Jew's life and/or property.  The collective Am Yisrael seems to be willing to do that.  The deal isn't fair; we all know that.  Then again life is often times not fair. The Shalits as much as we feel for them have put the nation in a tight position.  Not everyone would.  Others have sucked it up and dealt with their fate (i.e. Jonathan Pollard), because they did not want the nation to suffer like they had, but this really isn't about the Shalit family anymore, it is about us.  Are we up for the task?  Are we ready to move on in our Land and leave the land of the Plishtim behind?

Ruling Our Land

The name Gilad Shalit hints at a greater correlation between his release and the unfolding Geulah process. Shalit means ruler. Gilad is the place of Eretz Yisrael home to Eliyahu HaNavi.  We don't know the end of this story, for the story of Gilad Shalit as every captive Jew is really all of our stories.  We as a nation are a vessel for the divine light, which holds up the world.  It penetrates our being whether we are aware of it or not.  It is this role we play as a divine nation that puts us into this world as a partner in building it and nurturing it from a spiritual perspective. Gilad Shalit's release despite the emotional dilemma it causes us will help us to move forward as a Nation towards the complete redemption.  This is simply because, like Eliyahu HaNavi, we are a Nation which rules our Land from above and beyond nature. This is the very point and power behind Pidiyun HaShevuiim (redeeming a captive), it is above the intellect and forces us to believe in something bigger than ourselves. May Gilad Shalit's release be a sign for good things to come to our Nation and may it be the key which unlocks all of our captives as well as all of us.

Mozia

Just before Shabbat I took two of our kids along with a friend and his children to our Yishuv's long time defunct Givah, named Mozia.  The youth had started it years previously in response to Gush Katif, but it has since remained dormant of activity until recently.  My community's youth or at least some of them have gone away to Yeshivot and come back energized and ready to revive Mozia.  It might not be much, but it is a beginning and just like anything else, a beginning is better than nothing.

Here are the pictures...enjoy and Chag Somayach!

The kids on the way down (we are a few meters from the last house on the Yishuv)

Behind Us

One of our community's most fearless builders

Mozia's sign

Mozia and it's Succa

Doesn't look like much, but its a start

Starting a house!