Wishing Our Readers a K'siva Va'chasima Tova L

@LKQBKQP Wishing our readers a k’siva va’chasima tova l’shana tova u’mesuka! The next issue will be printed, G-d willing, for Sukkos. FROM PERSONAL EXILE TO GENERAL REDEMPTION D’var Malchus A GREAT TUMULT IN THE CHAMBER OF MOSHIACH Yom Kippur Story | Menachem Ziegelboim THE DIVINE MESSAGE OF THE NEW YEAR Rosh HaShana | Interview by Menachem Ziegelboim THE SECRETS OF THE LETTERS AND THE SOULS Chinuch | Yisroel Yehuda USA 744 Eastern Parkway MY FIRST TISHREI WITH THE REBBE Brooklyn, NY 11213-3409 Tishrei | Interviews by Nosson Avrohom Tel: (718) 778-8000 Fax: (718) 778-0800 [email protected] www.beismoshiach.org OPEN HOUSE FOR EVERY JEW EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: Shlichus | Rabbi Yaakov Shmuelevitz M.M. Hendel ENGLISH EDITOR: Boruch Merkur [email protected] MY TISHREI WITH THE REBBE ASSISTANT EDITOR: Story | Ofra Badosa Dr. Aryeh Gotfryd HEBREW EDITOR: Rabbi Sholom Yaakov Chazan [email protected] A CHABAD ENCLAVE IN WARTIME Feature | Shneur Zalman Berger Beis Moshiach (USPS 012-542) ISSN 1082- 0272 is published weekly, except Jewish holidays (only once in April and October) for $140.00 in the USA and in all other places for $150.00 per year (45 issues), by Beis HAKHEL – GATHERING BEFORE THE Moshiach, 744 Eastern Parkway, Brooklyn, NY 11213-3409. Periodicals postage paid at KING Brooklyn, NY and additional offices. Insight | Shmuel Chaim Abrahamson Postmaster: send address changes to Beis Moshiach 744 Eastern Parkway, Brooklyn, NY 11213-3409. Copyright 2008 by Beis Moshiach, Inc. Beis Moshiach is not responsible for the content of the advertisements. A¤S>OJJ>I@ERP FROM PERSONAL EXILE TO GENERAL REDEMPTION Translated and adapted by Dovid Yisroel Ber Kaufmann This week’s Torah reading, Nitzavim, is always it. And He will do you good and multiply you over read the Shabbos before Rosh HaShana. Further, your fathers.” this week’s Torah reading contains a clear, The wording of this passage teaches a deep lesson unmistakable reference to Redemption. We may about the nature of exile and Redemption. In therefore ask what is the connection between Hebrew, there are several verb forms, or Nitzavim, Rosh HaShana and Redemption. conjugations. Here, we would expect the causative The Torah reading begins as follows: “You are conjugation, since G-d is causing the Jewish people standing today, all of you, before the Lord your G-d to return. Indeed, that is the sense in which the – your leaders, your tribal chiefs, your elders, your verses are translated. However, the Torah does not officers, every Israelite man, your children, your use the causative conjugation; rather, it uses the women, and the converts in your camp – even your simple active conjugation. The literal meaning of the wood-cutters and water drawers.” These verses verse is that, “The Lord your G-d will return with follow the severe rebuke recorded in last week’s your captivity.” portion. There, the Torah predicts that the Jewish Obviously, the causative reading is the primary people will not observe the mitzvos, thus violating reading: G-d will cause the exiles to return. the covenant with G-d. As a result, they will Nevertheless, grammatically speaking, the verse experience devastation, hardship and suffering. says that G-d Himself will return with the captives Nevertheless, the Torah assures them that, after the of the Jewish people. Therefore the Sages explain torments of exile, they will be redeemed. They stand that in this verse G-d refers to His own exile, as it together before G-d this day, to enter into the were. G-d and the Jewish people are so closely covenant. Part of the covenant is the assurance that, attached, they cannot be separated; it is as if G-d just as the prediction of exile will be fulfilled, so will went into exile with the Jewish people. When the the promise that the Jewish people will return and Jewish people return to G-d, when they do t’shuva, repossess the land. This is the concept of Nitzavim, G-d will end their banishment. Their exile will end or standing. and G-d Himself – the Divine Presence – will return Shortly thereafter, there is an explicit promise of with them. Redemption. The Torah declares that: “Then the What is the relationship between this passage, Lord your G-d will return your captivity and have that “The Lord your G-d will return with your mercy upon you. He will return and gather you from captivity,” and the beginning of the Torah reading, among all the nations where the Lord your G-d has “You are standing today, all of you, before the Lord scattered you. [Even] if your dispersed are at the your G-d”? On the simplest level, it means that so ends of the heavens, the Lord your G-d will gather long as one Jew remains in exile, the ingathering of you up from there, and from there He will take you. all the Jewish exiles – the Redemption – is not And the Lord your G-d will bring you to the land complete. On a deeper level, it also means that so which your fathers possessed, and you shall possess long as one Jew remains in exile, so does the Divine #OBS0LPE&>1E>K> #'1 +-1&'!& existence, is a type of exile. The Nitzavim is always read the Shabbos exodus from this personal, inner before Rosh HaShana. The Torah exile requires us to truly perceive G-dliness, and act upon that reading contains a promise of perception. Thus our Sages tell us that the day of the gathering of the Redemption. The conjunction of the exiles is so great and so difficult that it seems as though G-d verb allows the verse to be read two Himself must take each individual out of exile with His own Hand. ways: one, G-d caused the exiles to An individual’s personal exile return, or two, G-d will return from and redemption includes, and is part of, the general exile and exile with them. The connection redemption of the Jewish people as a whole. The verse itself alludes to between the promise of Redemption this when it says, “The Lord your G-d will return with your and the beginning of the Torah captivity.” The phrase, “The Lord your G-d” is in the singular, reading is that so long as one Jew meaning that, aside from the remains in exile, so does the Divine collective relationship of the Jewish people with G-d, each Presence. Ending exile and gathering individual has a particular relationship, whether he is a leader all the Jews is a difficult task. Each or a drawer of water. When G-d seizes the hand of individual, whatever his or her status, the first Jew and takes him out of exile, then automatically, the has a personal exile which is part of Divine Presence itself should also and contributes to the general exile. go out of exile. At that moment, the complete and final All Jews must be redeemed to take the Redemption should occur. But redemption does not occur when Divine Presence out of exile. The the first Jew leaves exile. When G-d actually “seizes the hand” practical lesson is that all Jews must and takes a particular Jew out of exile, only the particular and go out of exile for the Redemption to condensed radiation of the Divine be true and complete. We are Presence connected with that individual is redeemed. Thus other responsible not only for our personal Jews, and the Divine Presence itself, remain in exile. Only the redemption, but that of the entire Redemption of all Jews redeems the Divine Presence itself. Jewish people. How does all this apply practically, on a personal level? It’s possible to think that going Presence. out of one’s own exile is sufficient. All that is Taking each and every Jew out of exile is a required is individual redemption – raising my level laborious and strenuous task, for there is both the of Torah study, my observance of mitzvos, etc. But general exile of the Jewish people as a whole, and the the opposite is true: when a Jew is redeemed from his particular exile of the individual. Any distancing from own personal “exile,” he must see what other Jews Torah and mitzvos, any moment that passes without need for their own “exodus.” All Jews must go out of an awareness that G-dliness permeates all of #'1 +-1&'!& 'PPRB established. True, there is a When there is Ahavas Yisroel – love for hierarchy, an order – from the leaders down through the water- a fellow Jew – between the leaders and drawers. This hierarchy has its the drawers of water, and all levels and importance. But first there must be an ingathering – the types in between, then the Jewish Redemption – of all the Jewish people, in a general sense. This people, “all of you,” will be inscribed for must include not only the leaders, but the wood-choppers and water- a sweet, good year. Indeed, it will be the drawers. This brings us to the year of Redemption. connection of Nitzavim and Redemption with Rosh HaShana. exile for the Redemption to be true and complete. For the verse says, “You are standing, today, all of Therefore, whatever depends on him, he must do. you, before the Lord your G-d.” This “today,” is Acting on this awareness counteracts a mistaken Rosh HaShana, which is why the portion of Nitzavim notion one might have. A person who has gone out of is always read the Shabbos before Rosh HaShana.

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