Chassidic Countdown to Redemption: 5780

חצות

Today is Friday, the 6th day, God's 6th millennium since He created Earth, after the night has passed, the time at 5780 being 12:43 pm.

If, as Moses explains,

כי אלף שנים בעיניך כיום אתמול כי יעבר

"For a thousand years are in Your eyes like yesterday, which passed ...." (Tehillim (90:4)

then we've passed from nightime, the first 500 years of that millennium, which began in year 5000, and have already entered daylight hours. If 500 years equals 12 hours, and we are 280 years since morning, and morning was at 6:00 am - let's say - then the time right now is 12:43 pm, 43 minutes after חצות!  

עלות השחר

The year the Ba'al Shem Tov went public was at 6:00 am, at dawn of the 6th day. The Alter Rebbe of Chabad became the 3rd generation thereafter to expose Chassidut, in the year 5550.

The light of Chassidus was lost from most Jews for 1,950 years; Since the 2nd Temple's destruction in the 4th millennium. Jews stuck with Torah, to be sure, but only to the well known 4 layers of Torah. The 5th layer of depth was an entirely new perspective of Torah that only Chassidus now brought to the public's cognitive grasp. 

This was a taste of the new light of Moshaich. This made for Jews for Moshiach to again become a valid topic of discussion. This new insight would have been shunned by Jews before that had they learned about it then because this topic brought about sorrowful memories. It had been a taboo subject earlier. The Jewish mind back then was unprepared to entertain the concept of Moshiach having been deeply frustrated over the years with fake candidates and, instead, met only with severe oppression by host countries.

The Wellsprings of Chassidus Opening Up

Kabballah, which preceded the exposure of Chassidus, began the reawakening of this secretive aspect of Torah, but only to a limited extent. Some secrets were then revealed, but kept under low profile because not everybody was "suited" in mindset to accept these. Kaballah opened the gates, so to speak, for Chasidus to begin trickling out.

Dawn arrived with the Ba'al ShemTov in 5500, and especially after sunrise the Alter Rebbe, in the year 5550, began to spread the word widely. By then all Jews were cognitively equipped by God to better digest this new light, this new spiritualism, of Chassidus.

These dates are significant from a Jewish Halachic perspective! How so?

We know that Chassidus will be learned during the Sabbatical Era in the 6th millennium. We will then be immersed in it, learning the most inner secrets of the infinite Torah. That will be the entire purpose of Jewish existence. This is what is meant by the metaphor, that in Moshiach's time we will partake in the festive "feast of the Leviathan and the Wild Bull" (סעודת שור הבר והלווייתן). That food is Chassidus.

Halachically, on Friday, once daytime arrives, it is a Mitzvah - a commandment for every Jew - to taste of the food being prepared for the Sabbath (טועמיה חיים זכו). That Mitzvah is time-dependent, sanctioned only starting at daybreak. Thus since the year 5500, we are obliged to taste some of that food in anticipation of what it'll be like.

Had you learned some Chassidus before 1740, it would have meant little to you because the command to learn Chassidus, that is -- to taste the future food of Shabbat -- only took effect in the year 1740, with the exposition of the Ba'al Shem Tov.

Other halachic aspects concern the times when formal prayer services begin or end. So, for example, the time of Tefillah, the  Shmoneh Esrei morning prayer, is a time that Chassidus regards as a fight -- as a struggle to keep well concentrated in prayer, doing our best to keep from being distracted. These times may well translate into what happened to the Jewish people during the progroms and then the holocaust.

Anyhow, those time of day aspects, as to how and when they occurred, are now well behind us. For us Jews today, we only await the Ultimate Redemption that's about to happen any day now. Surely God won't wait until the last minute to debut Shabbat aspects, as if Friday hours were as secular as before. Rather, along the lines of the אחישנה possibility, which is one way Moshiach can come, aside from the other inevitable way (בעתו), the blessings will shower down a lot sooner than expected.

 
[Gleaned form a Maamar (להבין הקושיא הידוע) of the 5th Lubavitcher Rebbe, the Rebbe Rashab, who founded the first officially Chassidic Yeshivah, said in 1903.]

Following the Footsteps of Moshiach in 5778

Some footprints of the Rebbe in action are easy to spot.

Today’s deserves mention. Today is
י׳׳ט כסלו תשע׳׳ח.

World events after all stem from Torah - the blueprint of the world. So let's look at secular developments to see how Torah life renders a refreshing perspective.

Today President Trump announced that Jerusalem is the eternal capital of the Jewish People! As far as America and most of the world was concerned, Israel was a country without a capital until now.

Today is Yud-Tes Kislev! Yud-Tes Kislev is a rather new chassidic holiday. An ancient primordial brightness, unbearable for mankind to have seen over the course of most of its history, until recently, is now finally becoming easy to behold. Chabad had turned this day into a Rosh Hashanna of Chassidus. This holiday is in commemoration of the Alter Rebbe's emancipation from certain death at the hands of the KGB in Soviet Russia. His freedom had vindicated his efforts to further disseminate the wellsprings of Chassidus.

That is, permission was granted from on high to spread these hidden aspects of Torah wholesale worldwide. Thereafter, with every Chabad Rebbe, these teachings gushed forth and burgeoned even more. That primordial bright light they were disseminating - is the new light of Moshiach!

The Alter Rebbe spurred his chassidim to “live with the times!”. He meant, put your heart into study of Torah as apportioned by the week and by day of the week.

Under the Rebbe MH”M this idiom transformed to mean that all you see, feel, hear and interact with should consider the imminence of Moshiach or his presence as its backdrop; The Rebbe urged us to always “think Moshiach!”

So, let's think Moshiach. Today is Yud-Tes Kislev. What does the industrious talmid find in today’s portion of Chumash (parshas Vayeishev, in the 4th section, being that today is Wednesday)? He learns the segment about Yehuda and Tamar.

In perek 38, possuk 15, says the Baal Haturim:

לזונה. ב' במסורה. ויחשבה לזונה. איכה היתה לזונה (ישעיה א, כא). מה תמר בבזיון ולבסוף בכבוד אף ירושלים סופה בכבוד, כדכתיב (זכריה ב, ט) ולכבוד אהיה בתוכה. וזהו זאת קומתך דמתה לתמר  (שה"ש ז, ח

Translation: Just as Tamar had to compromise herself (for the sake of lawful progeny) stooping to apparent humiliation in order to serve a future glorious cause, so too Jerusalem must first suffer disgrace before it can exult in its return to dominion.

This the Baal Haturim learns from a 5-letter word that repeats itself only twice in all of Tanach (see image of search results - 2 "hits" in all of Tanach), once in reference to Tamar; the other in reference to Jerusalem. This same word in both places suggests an association can be made between Tamar and Jerusalem.

(This connection, between Tamar and Jerusalem, is also alluded to by King Solomon in Shir Hashirim (7:8) - זאת קומתך דמתה לתמר.)

By coinciding Yud-Tes Kislev with the day Trump made his epic announcement, the Rebbe shows the association is operative for the era of Moshiach. If we "live with the times", then today’s Baal Haturim bespeaks of worldly events -- happening today in our times!

Here’s another "living with the times" nuance:

This week's days are among the shortest of the year. Midday is therefore close to noon, unlike the midday on any other summer day. Were we to make the Jewish calculation where each of "God's day" counts as 1,000 human years, then we are presently already into Friday, or Erev Shabbos. That means by the year 5778 we are plenty past 12 noon already (ie, past 5500)! The timing of glorifying Jerusalem on a day when Shabbat enters earliest seems significant. It suggests the rapid advance of The Era of Ultimate Redemption, the days of eternal Shabbat.

Hope to dance with you all in Yerushalayim, very soon, in our days!

UPDATE (12/24/17):
Just discovered too that last year on this day, on Yud-Tes Kislev 5777, Monday, December 19, 2016, Donald Trump won the electoral college vote (-- which counts -- as opposed to the popular vote, which doesn't count) and became President of the USA! So here we have yet another of the Rebbe's imprints.

“The Great Shabbat” before Pesach - as of 5776

We call the Shabbat before Pesach “The Great Shabbat” because of a great miracle that transpired on the Shabbat before the Jewish Exodus from ancient Egypt.

What miracle was that? It turns out many answers exist to this question, but here we’ll only consider the unique view of Chabad’s Alter Rebbe, from his “Shulchan Aruch”.

“When the Jews ushered in their Pesach lambs on that Shabbat, Egyptian firstborns clustered around them and asked the Jews what they were doing ... They were told, ‘It’s for a sacrifice to God Who will kill the Egyptian firstborns.’”

“The firstborns then went to their fathers and to Pharaoh requesting they expel the Jews. When rejected, the firstborns went to war against their fathers and Pharaoh, killing many of them. This is what is meant by ‘the Egyptians were struck down by their firstborn’.” [Psalms 136:10]

Note the Alter Rebbe makes no mention of the Jews’ success but rather highlights the internal war that arose between the firstborns and their fathers. So what greatness is there in this miracle?

The answer lies in what the Rebbe continues to say, that this miracle served as “the start of the redemption and the miracles.” That is, the greatness of this miracle is not just because many Egyptians were killed (“the Egyptians were struck down by their firstborn”), but rather the order and demand by the Egyptian firstborns to free the Jewish People was the turning-point that embodied the beginning of the Exodus!

This miracle had even higher value than the miracles of their exit from Egypt. The exodus from Egypt occurred once the power and force of Egypt was broken or annulled, during the Plague of Firstborns, when God took out the Jews. In contrast, the miracle of The Great Shabbat occurred while Jews were still within the Egyptian exile, when, nevertheless, the dominant representatives of Egypt (their firstborns) demanded the freedom of the Jews.

This is why on The Great Shabbat we read part of The Hagaddah, for, just as on the night of Pesach, when the Jews left Egypt, we read The Hagaddah, so too we read part of it on this Shabbat, because that’s when actually began “the start of the redemption and the miracles”!

So what has this to teach us now? In my humble opinion, we are seeing the start of The Ultimate Era of Redemption as today we watch all enemies of Israel striking down and destroying each other (in accord with Isaiah 19:2).

(On the other hand, why we continue to suffer horribly from individual sacrifices by Muslim vermin - eludes me! It is simply unintelligible and horrifying.)

Rumor re: 5775

A discussion is brewing online within the Groner family, שיחי''ו (Rabbi Leibel Groner was one of the Rebbe's secretaries).

The story is that the Alter Rebbe was once reading from Pekudei 38:28, which mentions the sum of 1775 talents collected.

ואת האלף ושבע המאות וחמשה ושבעים

Instead of reading the "hei" of "ha-elef" (the thousand) with a "patach", he read it with a "tzeirei" (which turns the letter "hei" into 5).

When the Alter Rebbe read it as “5775” his Gabbai corrected him. The Alter Rebbe then said again “5775”, to which the Gabbai once again corrected him. This repeated itself 4 times. Thereafter the Alter Rebbe went into deep meditation. When he quit his meditation he opened his eyes and whispered to the Gabbai that “5775” had something to do with the coming of Moshiach.

Rabbi Groner verifies the authenticity of the Rebbe previously revealing this story to at least one of his secretaries.

It is believed this story's source comes from an as yet unknown "Polish" sefer.

(And, as a blogger Rafi points out, here, 5775 = תשועה
and "every time the word תשועה is mentioned in Tanach, it always has to do with David. No exceptions.")

That's David as in "משיח בן דוד".

Let's hope the Alter Rebbe's prophetic story is confirmed.
---
This link, however, says the 5775 issue best!

Lech Lecha: Get going!

This week's Torah portion, "לך לך", starts with a command to our forefather Abraham, "Get yourself going from your land ... to the land I will show you."

G-d demanded of Abraham to leave his land, his birthplace and his father's house, to go to some unknown place. Rashi explains that G-d did not reveal to Abraham his destination in order to endear him to the land he yearns to discover.

A deeper perspective is this, as per the Alter Rebbe; By obeying the command, "Keep going", i.e., when the Jew unchains himself and sheds all measures and boundaries that his spiritual worship had heretofore taken on, and leaves this plateau to reach for a higher one, he will reach the plateau of "that which I will show you"; G-d will reveal to him the essence of man's Jewish core.

Let's merit to live with our forefather Abraham, to reach higher plateaus, by shedding bad habits and imaginary boundaries, and we'll merit seeing the real essence of our Jewishness ... and may we soon dance together, at the 3rd Temple, with King Moshiach!

From Brain to Semen

Illustration of embryonic development

A saying attributed to Kabbalah says, “a drop exudes from the brain and develops into semen”.

We know full well from Judaic tradition that "the generations are declining", such that a modern-day savant is more akin to a donkey than to any of our sages. So what did they know that we don't know?

Torah needn't apologize to "modern scientific wisdom", when, in fact, the more science progresses, the more it inches closer to Torah truth. The great wisdom of science is, after all, a huge myth. In fact, if you survey the last 100 years, what you'll find is that most scientific discoveries proved to be counter-intuitive! (e.g., see here).

Those who never learned Tanya, chapter 2, will have missed another such reference. There it states clearly, "... the child is derived from its father's brain," meaning to say, "semen, from the father's brain". But since when does semen derive from brain? We, the enlightened generation, are entitled to ask. Does it not, in fact, get manufactured and stored in the testicles (or ovaries)?  Any student of anatomy or embryology would be bewildered to discover semen derives from the brain.

But if Torah-derived sources tell us so, we do not doubt their veracity. For that which manifests in physicality derives from its spiritual configuration. What is down here follows in step from what is up there.

I've read hard-pressed reasons such as - the pituitary gland secretes a hormone to effect testosterone and sperm production, so here we see the brain-semen connection. Perhaps, but the sages do not wish to mislead in their statements. If they say it derives there, that's what they meant.

One could explain the child resulted from a brain-triggered event, after all, because the father thought conjugally of the mother, which aroused him, which eventually led to offspring. Thoughts in the mind initiated the whole matter. But this isn't so because the Tanya specifically uses physical terms -- semen and brain -- rather than "thoughts".

So a strictly cellular, somatic mapping for what the sages meant might be explained as follows:

In my first year of medical school, some 40 years ago, I was selected to deliver a lecture on developmental embryology. In particular, it was about the development of the organism's testicular tissue, from its earliest stages onward.

By divine providence this lecture fell into my lap to deliver, something that perhaps now, decades later, lets me shed light on what I learned back then. Here's what I remember. (I was using then a textbook I've since lost. I couldn't find that textbook in used book stores or on the internet.)

The crux of it is: Migration is a ubiquitous feature of primordial development. The embryological cells that become the substrate for testicular or ovarian tissue begin their journey in the mostly undifferentiated embryonic mass from a location that later differentiates into brain tissue. These brain-region cells migrate down through the embryonic tissues, like salmon up a river, until they finally localize in what will develop thereafter into testes and ovaries.

This journey, from the brain area to the seat of sperm or egg cell production, this embryological ontogenesis of the gonads, is what I believe our sages spoke of. There is cell migration from the brain region to the testicle region, a move that happens in an early developmental stage of the embryo.

- - - - - -

P.S. Speaking of phenomenal medical insight provided by Torah, I remember visiting a Chabad shul in Israel and seeing high up, atop a high bookcase, two books hermetically placed. I climbed up, took them down and looked into each. My eye caught two items that blew my mind.

One sefer, by Rabbi Chaim Vital, who transcribed much of the Arizal's teachings, speaks of 3 layers of membrane over the brain. That he knew this stunned me. Surely he did not get his knowledge by sawing open skulls (a tough job, especially if you don't want to destroy the delicate wrappings of the brain), nor did he fix and stain tissues and examine them under a microscope.

The other sefer, by the Tzemach Tzedek, made mention of the number of vessels in the liver. I was flabbergasted. The liver is the largest internal organ of the body and entirely perfused with blood vessels going every which way. How anyone could arrive at a number from this amazingly complex vessel network seems outright preposterous! Yet here comes the prince in his generation and states something any professor of hematology would laugh at. The Tzemach Tzedek, however, will enjoy the last laugh.

I'm sure the Tzemach Tzedek never owned a microscope, dissected a liver, nor counted vessels to get to his number. Did Moses inspect every mammal in the world before he asserted the pig, and only the pig (from all the animals in the whole universe), has split hooves and chews its cud? Of course not! Similarly, the our sages get their "scientific" knowledge from special insight provided by Torah and Talmud.

A Midrash Explained - The Future Foretold

Not all Jews left Egypt in the historical "Exodus". In fact, a minority left. Because they didn't want to leave, the majority died during the Plague of Darkness several weeks earlier (Rashi; Shmos 10, 22). Thus G-d spared the remaining Jews, busy burying their dead, from being embarrassed by Gentiles who otherwise would see this tragedy; Nor could the latter take joy in this.

The any-day-now final exodus for the Jewish diaspora will differ in some respects from the first exodus, one difference being the percentage of Jews involved. The final exodus, unlike the first, will include 100% of world Jewry - said the Rebbe. No matter how remote or obscure a place a Jew will be in, physically or spiritually, every Jew will be included.

How many, in fact, departed in the first exodus? The Torah uses a cryptic word to tell us (Shmos 13, 18): "... and the Israelites left Egypt 'penta-armed'". Just what does this Hebrew word mean? The Mechilta says, "It means 'well-provisioned' [i.e., all left]. Some say 1 out of 500 left, some say 1 of 50, and some say 1 of 5".

But how can opinions differ regarding a physical fact (probably well known in the time of the sages)? What's more, how could the disparity be so ridiculously vast, from 0.2% to 100% - a 500-fold variance?!

Says the Rebbe, these are not disagreements. Rather, the Midrash comes to teach us what The Final Redemption will look like! The sages are not speaking of the past; They're actually intimating to us what stages the future redemption process will go through!

At first, only 1 in 500 Jews will actually want this exile to come to an end. Most will prefer to focus on their primary concerns of business as usual. But the few desiring redemption will persist. Their tenacity will pay off because, later, 1 in 50 will push for its arrival. Finally, thanks to the perseverance of this minority, 1 in 5 will want out, and ultimately - it will include every Jew.

It's not unusual for a "Chabadnik" to hear, "What's this issue you have with Moshiach; He'll come when he'll come; What's with the urgency?"

Chabad responds simply by holding up a little light of truth that dispels more and more resistive darkness.

The many voices opposing Moshiach over the few "Moshichists" will not deter the latter.

A historical story from Tanach illustrates the point. King Chizkiyahu was faced with Sanheriv's huge army surrounding Jerusalem. They were primed for attack. The elders of Israel, even the majority of the Sanhedrin, tried to persuade the king to capitulate to this tremendous force, but Chizkiyahu held firm to his own opinion. He heard from Isaiah, the prophet of the generation, that G-d will vanquish the enemy. That was enough for him. The king remained without fear. Despite his many critics, he went to bed and slept soundly, sure to awake in the morning with a miracle rendered. He was proven right.

The majority doesn't hold sway against words of a prophet.