If I am not for myself, who will be for me?
Posted 7/1/2024
“אִם אֵין אֲנִי לִי, מִי לִי?”
(פרקי אבות א, יד)
“If I am not for myself, who will be for me?”
Ethics of Our Fathers 1, 14.
As we enter the last quarter of the Jewish year, Jews traditionally begin to focus on our past history, and spiritually prepare for the New Year.
In the Jewish calendar, historically, summer is the time to focus on the loss of our בית המקדש – our Holy Sanctuary in Jerusalem, which took place at this time 2,500 years ago. We have an opportunity to learn from our mistakes in the past in order to insure a better future.
One important lesson gleaned is that for as long as we lost our independence in our historical home, Israel, we were at the mercy of others. Most of the time, our hosts were oppressing us in the most depraved behavior known to mankind. The lesson learned is that our existence and resiliency has been in our faith to one day , once again, live in our own independent state of Israel. For the past three generations, we are blessed to experience this wonderful miracle. However, it has come with a great and painful price of insuring our freedom.
As we witnessed the horrific and barbaric attack on our people on October 7th, we saw how most of the world gave us only lip service support, and in reality, unabashedly allowed Antisemitism to rear its ugly head with impunity. As in our past, in the minds of our enemies, the victim became the oppressor and the oppressor became the victim.
Our strength has always been in our spiritual connection to G-d and the land of Israel. With G-d’s help, the past two and a half millennium, our great teacher, Hillel, taught us that our existence is self reliant. Others only care about us and present a false smile, when it is in their interest.
May we soon speedily merit to see all the hostages returned to their families and Shalom-שלום upon our people.
May we witness the dream of our forefathers to see:
— יְהִי רָצון מִלְּפָנֶיךָ ה’ אֱלהֵינוּ וֵאלהֵי אֲבותֵינוּ. שֶׁיִּבָּנֶה בֵּית הַמִּקְדָּשׁ בִּמְהֵרָה בְיָמֵינוּ. וְתֵן חֶלְקֵנוּ בְּתורָתֶךָ:
May the Holy Sanctuary be built speedily in our time and the lessons of the Torah continue to be our guide.
Have a healthy and a blessed summer.
Rabbi Tzvi Berkowitz