going home ... to yerushalayim

08 March 2010

My Handiwork is drowning ...

At The Israel Museum, displayed together for the first time, alongside a fragment of the book of Exodus from the late 1st century BCE, discovered in Qumran, and another fragment of Exodus dating to the 10th or 11th century CE is an

ancient fragment of the Song of the Sea

Ancient Fragments Reunited

Two parts of the ancient biblical manuscript separated across centuries and continents were reunited for the first time in a joint display ... The 1,300-year-old fragments, which are among only a handful of Hebrew biblical manuscripts known to have survived the era in which they were written, existed separately and with their relationship unknown, until a news photograph of one's public unveiling in 2007 caught the attention of the scholars who would eventually link them.

Then Moses and the entire congregation sang this Song of Praise to G-d for their miraculous rescue.

"I will sing unto the Lord, for He is highly exulted; The horse and its rider has He thrown into the sea.

The Lord is -my strength and song, And He is become my salvation; This is my G-d and I will glorify Him; MY father's G-d, and I will exalt Him. The Lord is the lord of war, The Lord is His name.

Pharaoh's chariots and his host has He cast into the sea. And his chosen captains are sunk in the Red Sea. The deeps cover them they went down into the depths like a stone.

Your right hand, 0 Lord, is glorious in power, Your right hand, 0 Lord, dashes in pieces the enemy.

And in the greatness of Your excellency You overthrow them that rise up against Thee; You send forth Your wrath; it consumes them as stubble.

And with the blast of Your nostrils the waters were piled up, the floods stood upright as a heap; The deeps were congealed in the heart of the sea.

The enemy said: I will Pursue, I will overtake, I will divide the spoil; My lust shall be satisfied upon them; I will draw my sword, my hand shall destroy them.'

You did blow Your wind, the sea covered them. They sank as lead in the mighty waters.

Who is like unto Thee, 0 Lord, among the mighty? Who is like -unto Thee, glorious in holiness, Fearful in praises, doing wonders? You stretch out Your right hand, the earth swallowed them.

You in Your love have led the people that You have redeemed; You lost guided them in Your strength to Your holy habitation.

The Peoples have beard, they trembled; Pangs have taken hold on the inhabitants of Philistia. Then were the chiefs of Edom affrighted; The mighty men of Moab, trembling taketh hold upon them; All the inhabitants of Canaan are melted away.

Terror and dread falleth upon them. By the greatness of Your arm they are as still as a stone; Till Your people pass over, 0 Lord, Till the people Pass over that You have gotten. You bringest them in, and plantest them in the mountain of Your inheritance. The place, 0 Lord, which You have made for Thee to dwell in, The sanctuary, 0 Lord, which Your hands have established. The Lord shall reign for ever and ever."

As the last words of the song died away, Miriam seized her timbrel, and followed by a multitude of Hebrew maidens and women, went forth proclaiming:

"Sing again to the Lord,

for He is gloriously exalted;

The horse and its rider

has He thrown into the sea."

"And the sea returned to its strength... The waters returned, and covered the chariots, and the horsemen, and all the host of Pharaoh that came into the sea after them; there remained not so much as one of them."

Beshalach : Exodus 13:17-17:16

In that hour, the ministering angels wished to sing songs of praise before G-d, but He rebuked them, saying: "My handiwork is drowning in the sea, and you wish to sing before me?!"

(Talmud, Sanhedrin 39b)

07 March 2010

Rabbi Moses ben Maimon, the Rambam

As an addendum to Yeranen Yaakov's fine post on the Rambam Synagogue renovation:

Point of No Return, (PNR) is dedicated to preserving the memory of the near-extinct Jewish communities, which can never return to what they once were [and] will attempt to pass on the stories of the Jewish refugees and their current struggle for recognition and restitution.

PNR features this video and two commentaries on the Reminder of Egypt's Jews:

One statement worth highlighting,

“The authorities are tentatively embracing Maimonides as part of their own heritage...."

Sound familiar?

This brings to mind the abject jealousy and hatred of the Palestinians, in their attempt to negate all the Jewish Holy sites, and declare them as theirs; together with their ranting and raving against Israel's desire to renovate and elevate these same Holy sites, so all can visit and benefit from them.

Two recent articles: The Jerusalem Post and The NY Times.

Also worth bringing attention to:

"On the eve of the Iraqi elections, the daughter of Iraqi Jews mourns the destruction of Baghdad’s once-vibrant Jewish community"

The Ark at the Tomb of Ezra HaSofer

Inscription on the Ark

GLOBAL ICE ... Thousands Passengers

Four Passenger Ferries.....

More than Fifty Ships ...

Stuck in Ice in the Baltic Sea

....Rescue Hampered

Thirty to 40 ships -- including several passenger ships -- were stuck Thursday in ice off the coast of Sweden, said a spokesman for the Maritime Search and Rescue Center in Gothenburg, Sweden. CNN

"As soon as they break the ice, it freezes over again," sea rescue spokesman Peter Lindquist said. He said no one was hurt and there were no immediate plans to bring people off the ships, but helicopters and military hovercraft were on standby in case evacuations would become necessary.

Barcelona, Spain -

Amateur Video Taken Aboard a Cruise Ship

Showing Massive Wave That Killed Two

"I thought I would end up in the sea, drowned," said Anna Lita, who had a black eye and bandages on her head and hand Thursday....Torrents of water gushed into the Louis Majesty, pouring through several floors of the ship....Passengers said the weather was terrible as they left Cartagena in eastern Spain Wednesday, and the captain announced he was skipping a planned stop in Barcelona and heading straight for Italy. Raw Video

We are witnessing earthquakes and great upheavels in the world:

more simanim of the times spoken of in our prophecies,

and more to come

Hold onto your Emunah and Bitachon!

Ooooops! Breaking News!

Just in.........more Dubai baddies

caught on extraneous film

[source and while you're there listen to this]

05 March 2010

Shabbat Shalom - Parshas Ki Tisa

Shabbat Shalom

Parshas Ki Tisa - Parshat Parah

(the Red Heifer of atonement)

This Parasha discusses, among other things,

the episode of

the Golden Calf:

[...]Perhaps the most difficult question in this parashah is: how could the Jewish people, after having witnessed the power of God demonstrated in the ten plagues and the Splitting of the Sea and after having received the Torah at Mount Sinai a mere forty days before, commit the sin of the Golden Calf? Although there were many mitigating factors that make their apparent sin much less heinous than a cursory reading of the text of the Torah would imply, the fact still remains that, in the Talmud's words: "Israel was not capable of committing such an act!" The Talmud's answer is that "the whole affair was God's decree, in order to set a precedent for the penitent."1 In other words, God maneuvered the Jewish people into this sin in order that they repent for it and come to know the sweetness of reconciliation.

The paradox of sin is that repentance makes it possible to forge a greater connection with God than was possible prior to the sin. Before sinning, an individual's relationship with God need only be strong enough to keep him on track; as long as he reminds himself that there is a God in the world who requires him to do x, y, and z, he will have no problem doing what is required of him. He is happy, stimulated, and inspired and is growing and developing spiritually in his relationship with God. Once he sins, however, he is confronted with the stark realization that, as perfect as this relationship may have seemed, it was neither strong enough nor deep enough to keep him from sinning (the proof being, of course, that he just sinned). By his choice, he demonstrated—at least on the level of consciousness on which he was functioning—that the enticement of this sin meant more to him than his commitment to God.

He must therefore delve into himself in order to find a place in his soul where God means more to him than the pleasure or fulfillment this indulgence seemed to offer him. This exercise in deepening his consciousness and awareness of God and re-establishing his relationship with Him at this new, deeper level is called teshuvah ("returning" to God) and is the essence of repentance. If the teshuvah is real, the individual will have reached a place within himself where his relationship and commitment to God are now so strong that he will no longer be able to commit the sin he is repenting for. Obviously, the more serious the sin, the greater the teshuvah required, and the deeper the resulting bond between the individual and God. [...]

You can read more from The Parsha of The Rebbe, overview

Post Purim: What a Cute Idea!

I received an email about a Raffle for a yeshiva.

It was colorful, professional, and very engaging.

Mostly it was about mon$y. The lure was the fancy house, furnishings, and private vault containing the weekly checks you’ll be receiving if you win the Raffle.

All this for just $36, or $50, or $100, or $180 for ticket(s).

However, there was another option, and when I read this I couldn’t help but wonder,

as the familiar ad goes, “What’s the Catch?”

Then I couldn’t help but grin, a big grin.

Why, for only a series of payments, stretched over several months, as your DONATION ……………….. you could be joining others in supplying a series of checks, stretched over several months to the RAFFLE WINNER.

Therefore, on a monthly basis, you will be supporting another Yid! ...How Great!

BUT why should all that money go to JUST ONE YID?

WHY wouldn’t it be better and more the essence of Chessed and True Tzedaka to just donate a monthly sum to a whole

GROUP OF WINNERS = your poor

and needy brothers and sisters

in your hometown

or in Eretz HaKodesh!?

I guess what will really happens is ..... the donations will total MUCH MORE than the amount going to that ONE YID,

indeed……. IT WILL INDEED

GO TO SUPPORT A WHOLE

GROUP OF YIDDEN

What a cute idea.

Want to see the video? Go here.

A Gutte PURIM it was!

04 March 2010

Privacy Exposed Again!

This topic has been greatly discussed. At one point, I saw an article saying that Orthodox Rabbis didn't see a problem with the airport scanners. However, when searching, I can no longer find it.

Now that the ice has been broken by the two modest muslim women travelers, it is time for Jewish travelers to step back and ALSO object to these privacy invaders. There must be another way to provide enhanced flight security, and these machines are not the way.

Muslim women who refused to take 'naked' full-body scan are barred from flight: Manchester to Pakistan

One of the women refused to go through the full-body scanner at Manchester Airport on religious grounds while her companion also declined for 'medical reasons'. The women were travelling together to Islamabad when they were selected to pass through the controversial security screen after checking-in at Terminal Two at the airport.

European rabbis up in arms over body scanners

Body scanners can store, send images

Pope criticizes body scanner. Quote: "Every action, it is above all essential to protect and value the human person in their integrity". "For you this reality represents an ever more task of complex organization and it is a labour that if often discreet and barely known, not always noted but which does not escape the eyes of God, who sees all of Man's works even those that are hidden."

Also articles here Yeshiva World

03 March 2010

Inspector Clouseau ... on it!

Dubai has hired Inspector Clouseau

to Find the Assassins

Stop the Verbal Gymnastics...

Ehud Barak in Washington DC 12 Adar 5770

DEBKA file: "Israel cannot accept the artificial differentiations between the Hizballah terrorists, the state of Lebanon and their sponsors" ...

Barak spoke of a "bizarre anomaly." Lebanon is a UN member, it has a militia whose members serve in parliament and government; it is supported and equipped by two other UN members nations, Syria and Iran, which has inserted into Lebanon "many civil servants in uniform and without uniform from both members."

This militia (Hizballah) has 45,000 rockets and missiles that happen to cover all Israel and are part of a deployment that tells them to activate them. "It has weapons systems that some - many sovereign nations - do not have," said Barak without elaborating..

We do not seek conflict, but if attacked, "we will not chase the individual terrorists who are building and digging in among urban concentrations inside civilian populations, but take both the Lebanese government and its infrastructure and other sources of sponsorship," he stressed.

The IAEA when it has the will can call a spade a spade and "stop all these verbal gymnastics about what the Iranians are really doing," which Barak described as follows:

By "developing neutron sources, making an implosion, experimenting on heavy metals with an array of arabesques of simultaneously activated detonators and working intensively on two hemispheres, Iran is not just working on a Manhattan Project-like crude nuclear device, but trying to jump straight into the second- or second-and-a-half generation of nuclear warheads."

He added: "Such warheads can be installed on top of ground-to-ground missiles with ranges that cover not just Israel but Moscow or Paris."

Israel cannot close its eyes to these developments, said Barak, and is obliged to be "intensive, concrete and conclusive" before this threat materializes.

And "it's not just about hegemonic, nuclear capabilities, I don't think the Iranians, even if they got the bomb are going to drop it immediately on some neighbor. They understand what may follow. They are radical but not total meshuganas."