going home ... to yerushalayim: Reb Neuberger – Vaeira

20 January 2023

Reb Neuberger – Vaeira – “End of Days"

PARADIGM FOR THE END OF DAYS

A recent demonstration at the University of Michigan called for “the demise of Israel” and the murder of Jews.

“Ain chadash tachas ha shemesh…. There is nothing new under the sun.” (Koheles)

The fact is: these people don’t have a clue what a Jew is and they have no idea why they hate us. “If the nations of the world had realized how important the Holy Temple was to them, they would have surrounded it with walls to protect it.” (Midrash Rabbah Vayikra 1:11)

We are their only blessing! Hashem told Avraham Avinu that all blessings to the nations would flow through his descendants! When our enemies say they hate us, they really hate themselves and they hate Hashem. That is why they attack us! Their path will end in destruction; they will march forward until they tumble over the cliff.

“When the wicked bloom like grass and all the doers of iniquity blossom, it is to destroy them until eternity!” (Tehillim 92)

In 1974, I was threatened on the subway by two large antisemitic thugs. I walked up to them and told them to their face that anyone who hates Jews is sick. They immediately started shaking – literally -- like jelly. They are nothing! Empty cowards!

In this week’s Parsha the plagues begin.

We have to understand the amazing relevance of these parshios to our own lives. Every day in our davening we mention Yetzias Mitzraim. Why? Because Ancient Egypt was the paradigm for today.

What was Paro’s reasoning for subjugating our ancestors? He was worried they might “join our enemies.” What does that mean? Nothing! Since when did the Children of Israel threaten Paro. Never!

It’s all a fiction, just the way today’s anti-Semitism is founded on fiction.

Let’s see what really happened in Egypt. This we must understand if we are to understand our world.

Israel was enslaved by the most powerful nation on earth. They were threatened by assimilation through which they would – G-d forbid – have ceased to exist as a discrete nation.
In order to save His nation, Hashem appointed a great leader, Moshe Rabbeinu, to lead our ancestors out of spiritual and physical slavery. But the people still did not want to leave. They “glued” themselves to the foreign culture.
Hashem mercifully saved His people by destroying the nation that enslaved them. Even so, most of the people still refused to leave with Moshe Rabbeinu. But those who did leave were protected from the destruction and plagues that destroyed Mitzraim.
After witnessing the complete destruction of Egypt, those who followed Moshe merited to go to Har Sinai, upon which Hashem descended to give them their Eternal Torah, through which they were spiritually and physically liberated and through which they spiritually liberated the entire world.

My friends, we have to know that this scenario is being reenacted today.

We, like our ancestors, are in danger of physical and spiritual assimilation into the idolatrous culture of the Western World. We are so bound up with this culture that we are in danger of disappearing forever into the quicksand. For that reason, Hashem is at this very moment destroying this giant culture around us. The entire Western World, which we think is so “attractive” and “normal,” is in the process of collapse. There will be nothing left, just the way there was nothing left of Egypt after Hashem destroyed it.

The enormity of this is almost impossible to contemplate, but it is happening.

How will we survive? The same way our ancestors survived the collapse of Ancient Egypt.

Hashem will send a redeemer – may it be soon! – to save us. And He will once again present the Torah to us and return the world to the pristine state in which it once existed. We have to know that Hashem will save us, but only if we hold on tightly to the Torah and flee from the collapsing culture around us the way our ancestors fled from Mitzraim.

These parshios are the paradigm for the end of history. It is no accident that anti Semitism is escalating and that we are increasingly isolated. It is no accident that the surrounding culture is collapsing. Now is the time for us to cry out to Hashem the way our ancestors cried out in Mitzraim.

We should not be afraid. Hashem will hold our hand. But we must beg Hashem to save us. If we do this, we will soon see the Complete Redemption and a world which is completely healed, like the perfect Gan Eden which Hashem created at the beginning of history.

This time we will be entering the Garden and not leaving!

Can you imagine the greatness of the Coming Days!