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DON'T MISS OUT SPACE IS LIMITED RESERVE NOW! Adar 5758 • March 1998 U.S.A.$3.50/Foreign $4.50 ·VOL XXXI/NO. 3 THE JEWISH OBSERVER (ISSN) 0021-6615 is published monthly except July and August by the Agudath Israel of America, 84 William Street, New York, N.Y. 10038. Periodicals postage paid in New York, N.Y. Subscription $24.00 per year; two years, $44.00; three years, $60.00. Outside of the United States (US funds drawn on a US bank only) $12.00 surcharge per year. Single copy $3.50; foreign $4.50. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to: The Jewish Observer, 84 William Street, N.Y., N.Y.10038.Tel:212-797-9000, Fax: 6 212-269-2843. Windows of Heaven Printed in the U.S.A. Rabbi Shimon Finkelman RABBI NISSON WOLPIN, EDITOR I I G-d Centered or Rebbe/Messiah-Centered: Which is Normative Judaism? EDITORIAL BOARD OR. ERNST L. BODENHEIMER Rabbi Chaim Dov Keller Chairman ll RABBI JOSEPH ELIAS JOSEPH FRIEDENSON Hospice Care: Can it Have a Jewish Heart? RABBI NOSSON SCHERMAN Rabbi Yosef Stern MANAGEMENT BOARD AVI FISHOF NAFTOLI HIRSCH Louis J. Septimus <l"V: an Exemplary Torah Baa/ebos ISAAC KIRZNER Yonason Rosenblum RABBI SHLOMO LESIN NACHUM STEIN l RABBI YOSEF C. GOLDING Drunk on Stories 8u$lnen Man;:iger A Review Article by Hillel Goldberg Published by 39 Agudath Israel of America POSTSCRIPT RABBI MOSHE SHERER PRESIDENT The Most Recent Guest Anonymous U.S. TRADE DISTRIBUTOR ISRAEU DISTRIBUTOR Feldheim Publishers Netllemia Rosenberg 200 Airport Executive Park Kiryat Telshe Stone. 108A Spring Valley, N.Y. 10977 O.N. Harei Yehuda. ISRAEL POETRY EUROPEAN REPRESENTATIVE AUSTRALIAN DISTii/BUTOR On the Avenue M. T. Bibel man Gold's Sook & Gift Co. Beily Palluch Grosvenor Works 36 William Street Mount Pleasant Hill Balaclava 3183, Vic., London ES 9NE, ENGLAND AUSTRALIA I lETIERS TO THE EDITOR THE JEWISH OBSERVER does not assume responsibility for the Kashrus of any product, publication, or service advertised in its pages © Copyright 1998 MARCH 1998 VOLUME XXXl/NO. 3 Rabbi Shimon Finkelman CONCEALMENT AND guiding hand of Prov­ REVELATION idence is plainly appar­ ent. The Jews' salvation wo Rabbinic was a declaration of holidays were Hashem to His beloved Tgranted the Jew­ people: "When you ish people, Purim and were exiled, My Shechi­ Chanuka. Ostensibly, na accompanied you6 their celebrations seem and it has never depart­ diametrically opposite ed from your midst. I one another. As the am here guiding and commentators point protecting you, and I out, prior to the will always be with you, Chanuka miracle, the even when My Pres­ Jewish soul was endan­ ence is not readily dis­ gered by the anti-Torah cernible." decrees of the Syrian­ The Jews perceived Greek regime. In the Hashem's Presence at days of Mordechai and that time and basked in Esther, the lives of the Jews were at stake. ir cl es His hidden radiance. And how did they This distinction is reflected in Chanu­ respond? "They accepted [the Torah] ka being a festival of O\Nilm ?'m, praise again in the days of Achashveirosh, as and thanksgiving, a means of celebra­ it is written, 'Kiymu ve'kiblu tion that is entirely spiritual, while Hayehudim, The Jews established and Purim is a day of nnr.n:n nnvr.i, feasting accepted' (Esther 9,27) - they estab­ and gladness'. In fact, the miracles that s he el lished [in those days] that which they these festivals celebrate and the lessons had already accepted [at Sinai]':' It was, that they impart complement one t ur es as the comn1entators explain, an accep­ another. tance born of intense love for Hashem The Purim miracle occurred during (Devarim 31,18). The Vilna Gaon' sees and recognition of His eternal bond the seventy-year exile between the First this teaching as far more than a play on with His people. and Second Temple eras. It was a time the words Esther and astir. The verse of great hester Panim, Divine conceal­ quoted is from a passage which foretells LIGHT AMID THE DARKNESS ment. The Jewish people had been ban­ that the Jewish people would ultimate­ ished from their Land; the arrogant Per­ ly stray from the proper path and as a period of the Second Beis sian kings were certain, according to result would be subject to severe retri­ Hamikdash was, in a sense, a pre­ their miscalculations, that the Beis bution and what one commentator5 lude to the long exile that would Hamikdash would not be rebuilt.' refers to as "the greatest trial of all" - follows. The Shechina was not manifest The Talmud3 asks: Where is Queen hester Panim, when Hashem's guiding to the same degree as it had been dur­ Esther alluded to in the Torah? It hand in man's affairs is not easily ing the First Mikdash era and prophe­ answers: In the verse, V'anochi haster apparent. cy had come to an end'. It was in this astir panei bayom hahu- "But I will The miracle of Purim was a he'aras period, a "twilight" before the "dark­ utterly conceal My face on that day" panim, revelation of Hashem's ness," when the miracle of Chanuka -----·--··------- Omnipresence, in a time of Divine con­ occurred. In "Al Hanissim;' we speak of Rabbi Finkelman, a rebbe in Yeshiva Darchei Torah, cealment. True, it involved no open mir­ the Chashmona'im's victory over the Syr­ Far Rockaway, NY, is a frequent contributor to acles, but the entire story, from the feast ian-Greeks, and our kindling of the these pages, including "It's Time to Face the Music;' in Feb. '95. He is the author of several biographies with which the Megilla opens to the menora represents the miracle of the oil published by ArtScroll Mesorah Publications, as hanging of Haman and his sons, was a which burned for eight days in the newly well as the recent More Shabbos Stories. tapestry of hidden miracles in which the dedicated Temple Menora. 6 The Jewish Observer, March 1998 Maharal writes that the open mira­ cle of the oil bore witness to the mira­ cle of the military victory: "Chanuka was • n recent years, we have been witness to major established primarily because of the vic­ tory over the Syrian-Greeks. However, Iworld events which have affected the fate of the it was not obvious that the victory was achieved through the miracles of Jewish people in a very positive way. In fact, the Hashem and not because of their might. Therefore, the miracle of the Menora's way in which these events unfolded seem to lights occurred, so that they would know represent a semblance of the Chanuka and Purim that the war, too, was through rnira­ cles."10 In Shir Hashirim, we read, "I miracles, and as such, should not be forgotten. thought I would be forever alone- but behold! He was standing behind our Rather, we should utilize them to draw faith 1n wall, observing through the windows, peering through the lattice work" (Shir Hoshem's guidance of our affairs.