The Only Answer

I usually plan to come to the computer totally inspired and uplifted from classes, with the intention of sharing and illuminating and inspiring. But it just can't happen tonight.

Tonight, I feel dead inside. I feel suffocated, and dazed, and angry.

I am usually graceful in the face of darkness. I feel like I can uplift it. I feel like I have the power to pierce through it, to reveal and create a pathway of clarity and goodness and purpose.

But not tonight.

For the first time ever, I feel like I can grasp what the Rebbe said about the times before our ultimate redemption - that there will be "darkness of darkness", a confusion so thick and blinding that you can't even attempt to make sense of it or release yourself from it's entrapment.

I want to pretend. I want to hear the Rebbe's words in my ears and know exactly the right way to react and feel. I want to say Perek Lamed-Beis and Mem-Aleph of Tanya and feel better. But I can't...and I will not lie.

Right now, over two hundred of my brothers and sisters are lying on hospital beds, beaten and bruised. The front page of the newspaper today sent me straight into emotions that I've never had to grapple with before. Jews beating Jews with rods?! All of my being struggled to make sense of it, but when I tried - my soul felt like it was going to explode. There are certain insanities that a soul just can't bear, can't tolerate.

It felt like the world just ended - right there on the front page.


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Tonight, I have some questions for you, G-d. When will you reveal your master plan? Why are you dragging things out? Why are you empowering my enemies? Why are you sitting back while blood pours from your children? Why did you dare call this place my homeland? I hate your facade. I hate your concealment. I hate how much I need you, and I hate how you seem to be running away. And tonight, I want to hate your country. Tonight, I want to hate your people.

Your world just got flipped upside down, and I can't sit straight. Answer my questions. I need answers.

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I have some live Matisyahu playing in my ears right now, and he's telling the crowd that no matter how blinding the dark, "a person has the ability to dig deep and see through the world, see the G-dliness."
And I'm studying the newspaper right now, trying to see the picture through my blurring eyes. A crowd of young Jews trying to protect their home, while Jews on horses lift clubs to their faces. Behind the pained and struggling faces, behind all the chaos...is a banner. It reads, "Hashem Hu HaMelech - G-d is the King".

The contrast almost breaks my heart. Jews beating Jews. G-d is King. Jews beating Jews. G-d is King.

But for me, right now - struggling for comfort - the message seems clear. G-d still reigns. He has a plan. He is ruling. He has not fled the scene. He's not just sitting back watching the smoke rise. G-d, a King to a mighty nation, is crying right here alongside his people. His tears are shaking the earth beneath my feet.

So for now, I am still in the dark. I will cry. But I don't feel so alone - "Hashem Hu HaMelech". My King is unleashing his wildest tears right by my side.

May all our tears soon evaporate from the light and warmth of Moshiach.

For Moshiach is the only answer.



[Here in Israel, everyone is in total shock, a sort of daze. The holocaust-like images and stories of policemen ripping off the shirt of a Jewish mother, knocking a toddler to the ground...no one can even talk about it. The "State of Israel" has finally gone completely mad.
A 15 yr old boy's skull was crushed today when one of the (Jewish) policemen purposefully stampeded him with a horse. The newspapers (!) are asking that we all pray for Yechiam ben Rachel.]