Dear friends,
A few years back, I was standing on a mountain top listening to my grandson (who I turned into my tour guide for the day). The mountain top is called Mitzpeh Yosef, and overlooks Yosef’s tomb. We could see the city of Shechem, one of the largest and most hostile Arab cities. He told me the story of how it was taken in 1967.
The war had erupted on many fronts simultaneously, and the army was focused on defending the borders. The mayor of Shechem assumed that the Israeli forces that were “busy” would head down from the northern border and eventually head towards Shechem. The Arabs were looking north to wait for the battle to begin.
Now the Jewish part of the story.
A group of soldiers were (I am looking for a tactful word, but so far none has come up) … lost. They had somehow strayed from the large group of soldiers in the north, and ended up heading south…. They accidentally entered Shechem from the undefended southern part of the city. No one was expecting Israeli forces from that direction.
The Israeli officer immediately recognized the mortal danger they were facing by finding themselves accidently in Shechem, and thought quickly. He asked to be brought to the mayor immediately in order to give him an urgent message. When he arrived at the mayor’s office, he said,
“If you surrender now, I will inform the forces headed down from the north that there is no reason for them to enter Shechem. If not, they will flood your city with soldiers, and treat you the way you would have treated us.” A white flag was soon waving over Shechem.
I thought about this story just a few days ago. My husband and I took a week-long bein hazmanim break, spending five days retreating from our busy lives at my grandson’s hilltop vacation unit which overlooks… Shechem. It is very, very quiet; you can hear your own breath. No cars pass, no voices break the night’s silence.
The war that is taking place in Gaza and in the northern part of Israel seem to exist in another world.
But not really.
The third day of our doing delightfully little, my grandson asked if we would like to tour around a bit. The place that I wanted to re-visit was the area where Yehoshua built an altar when about to enter the land. It is not far from the mountains mentioned in this week’s parshah, Mt. Eival and Mt. Grizim, the place where the blessings and curses were given to the Jews after crossing the Yarden into the Land.
I had been to the ruins of the mizbe’ach once before, but more archeological digging has taken place since and I wanted to hear and see more about what’s been uncovered. They found a small metal plate (a kamea in Hebrew) with 11 mentions of the word “curse” still legible on it (parallel to the 11 curses in the parshah), ending with the letters YKVK in ancient script. It is the oldest finding with Hashem’s Name that has as yet been found.
Surprisingly the mizbe’ach looks like a mizbe’ach, with a ramp and a hollow inside. The ashes there are all from animals that were used for korbanot (no other animals such as those used by other peoples). You may very reasonably be wondering why I am sharing this with you. It is because, as the Parshah begins, Hashem places before us both the blessings and the curses. The word “places” or more literally, “gives” are in present tense.
The blessings and the curses are always there; they are authored by the same Author. He wants us to hear what the choices really are, and to recognize that He lets us determine the way our ultimate reality will be.
The city of Shechem has a long and negative history. It is the place from which Yosef was sold, the place of Dinah’s abduction, and the place where we lost our unity and divided up into the ten tribes and the two tribes each having their own kingdom.
The Sfas Emmes takes a radical step in letting you see the city’s true nature. He says the letters of its name (Shin kchofff Mem) stand for the words “Sham (shin), Kavod (kchoff), Malchuso (mem),” meaning, ‘There is the Glory of His kingship.’
What that means is the people like Yosef, who, when the brothers who sold him into slavery were at his mercy, told them that all that had happened to him (the sale, the enslavement, the temptation, the years in prison) were part of Hashem’s plan (which of course it was, both in his emergence as a tzadik and as the one who was there to save the rest of his family, the nascent Jewish people.)
It means that Dinah’s daughter ended up becoming Yosef’s wife (a story in itself, but not for this letter...), and that the division of the kingdom (which has never healed) will lead to a reunification when Moshiach comes. The worst curses are there for you and me to turn into blessings.
Even now: Wherever you are.
The war has been brutal, and unimaginable, but laced with spiritual beauty that no one could have conceived of. The continuum of miracles has opened even the eyes of the frum… those who know, and want, but may not have the “advantage” that other less informed of what the Torah has told us for thousands of years about Hashem’s undying love for us His commitment towards our endurance; they are more easily overwhelmed by the constant unfolding of more and more hashgachah, more and more love.
Much love, and for those of you who are on vacation, enjoy it so that you will be chomping at the bit to get back into the real stuff!
Tziporah
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