The Carrot, the Fish and Moshiach

By Rabbi Pinchos Lipschutz

Imagine a land where people have no appreciation for music, where the sounds of song are never heard. In a country like that, instruments are viewed with suspicion, and voices raised in harmony are quickly stilled.

Unbeknownst to each other, there are lone individuals scattered throughout the country who love music, but they keep it a secret. In the solitude and seclusion of their homes, they might play a few bars and hum a melody, but only quietly.

One day, word spreads of a gathering where all of them will come together, the musicians and the singers, those who love to sing and those who love to hear. They will ignore the disdain and disapproval of the masses and congregate, their instruments and voices joining together.

It will be the most glorious song ever heard, the secret longing and hope of so many, more than a thousand sounds fusing as one.

The very fact that this gathering will take place gives vent to the song within the participants.

This analogy helps explain the way the Vilna Gaon (Shir Hashirim 1:17) describes the power of the Mishkon. Every individual Jew was walking around with a flame in his heart, but until they had a place where they could unite - a physical location where they could connect - those passions lay dormant.

The Mishkon allowed the collective fires to unite and light up the world. There, the secret could emerge. Like musicians meeting and creating song, a nation of dveikim baHashem found each other in this sacred structure, elevating the landscape.

The Shechinah resides inside the heart of every good Jew. The Mishkon is the place where all those Jews gather, as the Shechinah that dwells within them comes alive and expands, kevayachol. Hashem therefore commanded them to take a “terumah” from every “ish asher yidvenu libo,” allowing every person to contribute from his heart toward the construction of the Mishkon, enabling all the hearts to join together in this special place.

In the Mishkon, every feature reflected Divine mysteries, and each element was filled with cosmic significance. Just as the calendar ushers in the month of Adar, we begin reading the parshiyos that detail the particulars of the construction of this special place.

The month of Adar has taught us that, as a nation, we can achieve salvation. The shekolim that were collected symbolize that the Mishkon was meant to achieve the sense of shared purpose and desire that defines every Jew.

Achdus is a current buzzword, often misused as a catchphrase manipulated to paint those of us who have standards and traditions as haters. If we dare call out the falsifiers of the Torah for what they are, we are condemned for lacking achdus.

The Mishkon, which was the epicenter of unity in the universe, came with severe restrictions. While everyone could contribute to its construction, there were many halachos delineating who could approach the Mishkon and who couldn’t, who could perform the avodah there and who couldn’t. Achdus comes with rules. It is not a free-for-all, as some would have you think.

The pesukim at the beginning of Sefer Bamidbor (1:50) charge shevet Levi with assembling and dismantling the Mishkon and its keilim when the Bnei Yisroel traveled. Any outsider who dared approach and attempt to do the coveted work specified for shevet Levi would be killed. There were also precise rules for each one of the keilim.

Achdus doesn’t mean an absence of rules. It doesn’t mean that anything goes. It means that everyone who beholds holiness has a unique role to play in the mosaic of Yiddishkeit.

While detailing the laws of the Mishkon, the posuk says, “Vehayah haMishkon echad - And the Mishkon will be one.” What does the Torah mean with this addition? The Ibn Ezra explains that the oneness of the structure reflects the oneness of Hashem’s creation. It reflects harmony and unity.

The Bnei Yisroel became one, coming together at Har Sinai and then at the Mishkon, the individual sparks of fire within each person joining together in a torch. The Shechinah in each person joined together at this special place, bringing back experience of Har Sinai, forming a home for the Shechinah in this world and a place where the voice of the Shechinah could converse with Moshe.

The Me’or V’shemesh writes that chassidim would make it a priority to travel to their rebbe for Shabbos to be inspired. But the prime growth was not necessarily derived from the rebbe’s Torah or tefillah. He writes that chassidim achieved more than anything else from simply being together. Each chossid who went to the rebbe for Shabbos had tens of new teachers, as each of the other Jews with whom he had gathered possessed the ability to teach him something. From this one, he learned about kavanah in davening. In that one, he saw the definition of oneg Shabbos. And in a third, he observed extraordinary middos.

The achdus created multiple rebbes.

The Arizal told his talmidim to recite the words, “Hareini mekabel olai mitzvas asei shel ve’ahavta lerei’acha kamocha,” before starting Shacharis. These words are printed in some siddurim. What is the significance of the particular mitzvah of ve’ahavta lerei’acha kamocha before beginning a new day’s tefillah?

The Kitzur Shulchan Aruch (12:2) explains: “Unity and connection in the lower realms create a bond in the higher spheres, and the tefillos join together and are beloved by Hashem.”

The feeling of connection that a person experiences as he walks into shul - Yankel’s cheerful good morning, Moishe’s careful Birchos Hashachar, the way Chaim respectfully holds the door for an older man - opens gates in Shomayim. The shared fire they have created is more powerful than their individual points of light.

When I lived in Monsey, I had a delightful Sephardic neighbor who enjoyed teasing me on Friday nights as we left shul. Week after week, he would ask me what purpose the carrot serves on gefilte fish. He would laugh heartily at his own question. While I’m not privy to the mysteries concealed in ma’acholei Shabbos, of which there are many, I enjoyed the exchange, because it hammered home a beautiful truth. He would go home and eat his traditional Shabbos foods, and I would eat mine, yet we agreed about why we were eating them, Whom we were honoring, and what we hoped to achieve. He reveled in his points of light and I reveled in mine, and together we thrived on our individual mesorah, handed down generation after generation through the millennia of the exile.

Rav Avigdor Miller would say that Shabbos is our Mishkon. He explained that this is hinted to by the fact that the 39 melachos are derived from the building of the Mishkon. Note the similarities in the way Jews prepared to enter the holy structure and the way we prepare for Shabbos. Look at how each has strict rules that must be observed, the danger of ignoring them, and, most of all, the way each is meant to create an earthy sanctuary for Hashem, carving out a physical resting place for the Shechinah.

On Shabbos, there is a sense of achdus, because we don’t see our neighbors as carpenters or lawyers, mechanchim or electricians. We are all Jews who have come together in our bigdei Shabbos - much like the bigdei avodah - for Hashem’s glory, a reflection of what life was like around the Mishkon.

With the words of the Vilna Gaon as our guide, we can understand the oft-repeated lesson that achdus will lead to geulah. It is not merely in the merit of unity. It is the synergistic effect of unity - when we camp around a place and allow the song within each of us to emerge, fusing with the melodies of others - that lays the opening for the geulah.

When that moment comes, our shared hopes, dreams, and ambitions will combine to create a place where the Shechinah will rest.

I can do it, you can do it, we can all do it - if we do it together.

Forged in a crucible of holiness, we keep the embers alive, awaiting the day when we rid ourselves of the ashes that prevent us from joining all the holy embers and bringing about the great reunion.

This brings us to Chazal’s dictate: “Mishenichnas Adar marbim b’simcha - When the month of Adar enters, we increase our joy.” With this dictum, they are teaching us not only that Adar is a month of simcha, but that we are commanded to increase it. Simcha is not merely an emotion; it is an avodah, a spiritual practice.

The obligations of most months involve us doing things. During Elul, we do teshuvah. During Tishrei, we continue doing teshuvah, construct a sukkah, eat and live in the sukkah, purchase the arba minim, and shake them. During Kislev, we light the Chanukah menorah. During Nissan, we rid our homes of chometz and eat matzah. And so on. But the defining mitzvah of Adar is unique. It is not something we do with our hands, but rather something we cultivate in our minds and souls - the obligation to be happy and to increase that happiness.

The obligation Chazal place upon us is not a superficial happiness brought about by escaping reality or ignoring pain. On the contrary, the story of Purim is born in a world of danger, uncertainty, and hidden threats. The Megillah recounts that the Jewish people stood on the brink of annihilation. Yet, the Megillah does not recount open miracles, such as the splitting of the sea during Krias Yam Suf and other open miracles described in Tanach. Instead, it describes a quiet, concealed salvation unfolding behind the scenes.

And that is precisely where Adar’s simcha lives - not in the absence of struggle, but in the discovery of meaning within it.

The Megillah does not mention the explicit Name of Hashem, yet His presence saturates every posuk. Coincidences align, reversals occur, hidden turns become redemptive. Adar teaches that joy is the ability to perceive the Hashgocha Protis - Hashem’s orchestration of events - even when b’hastorah, masked by ordinary circumstances. Simcha does not come from being naïve. It is spiritual vision.

The simcha of Adar is the joy of trust. The joy of realizing that what appears random is in fact precise. That which feels chaotic is being gently guided. In a world where so much feels unstable, Adar proclaims the quiet truth: What happens to us, to Am Yisroel, and to the world is all part of a story being carefully written.

Sadness contracts the soul. Simcha expands it. A sad person shrinks into himself. A joyful person has space for others, for appreciation, for emunah and bitachon. When Chazal say marbim b’simcha, they are telling us to widen our hearts, to make room for others and for hope.

When we widen our hearts and souls, we can appreciate all that Hashem does for us and prepare for geulah. By connecting with others through achdus, we open ourselves to experiencing simcha and allowing it to expand beyond ourselves. For simcha is not a reward for when life makes sense. It is the tool that allows us to make sense of life. It flows from the courage to smile when Hashem is hidden, to trust in His goodness before it becomes visible, to dance even when the music is faint, and to recognize that everything that happens is purposeful and, ultimately, good.

Mishenichnas Adar marbim b’simcha. When Adar arrives - in the cold of winter, in the darkness of a fearful world, in the confusion of worrisome news, as our land is surrounded by unfriendly neighbors and we feel the tightening of golus - we are joyous anyway. For we know that the megillah of our existence has already been written, and we are approaching the happy ending that will usher in Moshiach tzidkeinu bemeheirah.

Tasting History

By Rabbi Pinchos Lipschutz

This week’s parsha opens with the words, “Ve’aileh hamishpotim asher tosim lifneihem - These are the laws that you shall place before them.”

Rabi Akiva, in the Mechilta, hears in these words not merely a command to teach, but a lesson in how Torah must be transmitted. Tosim lifneihem, he explains, does not mean to present information in the abstract, but to lay it out like a shulchan aruch, a fully prepared table, arranged with care, clarity, and invitation. Torah is not meant to be delivered as raw data, but as nourishment: accessible, enticing, and alive.

Great teachers exhaust themselves in pursuit of this ideal. They labor not only to know Torah, but to serve it, presenting it with flavor, with structure, with an inner music that allows the student not merely to learn, but to taste and appreciate. A good rebbi does not speak at his talmidim. He sets a table before them and invites them into a feast.

One such rebbi was Rav Mendel Kaplan. His shiur was not simply a classroom. It was an atmosphere. We did not merely absorb Torah from him. We breathed it in. He fed us a wide menu of spiritual food, equipping us not only with knowledge, but with the tools to interpret the world beyond the walls of the bais medrash. Headlines became texts, and world events became commentaries, refracted through the prism of Torah until their deeper meanings emerged.

There is a story told of a villager in the legendary town of Chelm who returned home from shul one Shabbos and repeated the rov’s sermon to his wife.

“The rov says that Moshiach may come very soon,” he told her, “and he will take us all to Eretz Yisroel.”

His wife wrung her hands in distress. “But what will be with our chickens? Who will feed them? How will we live?”

The husband stroked his beard thoughtfully. “You know, life here is hard. The goyim harass us, we are poor, the roof leaks, and our feet freeze all winter. Maybe it will be better there.”

She thought for a moment, and then her face lit up. “I have a solution,” she said. “We’ll ask Hashem to send the goyim to Eretz Yisroel - and we’ll stay here with the chickens.”

We smile at the foolishness of Chelm, but too often, we are no different. We live inside history, yet fail to read it. We experience events, but miss their meaning. We mistake warning signs for noise, and blessings for burdens. We assume we understand the world, when in truth we need teachers - living meforshim - to explain to us what is really happening between the lines of the newspaper.

Chazal tell us: “Why was the mountain called Sinai? Because from it descended sinah - hatred.” From the moment the Torah was given and the Jewish people became a nation with a mission, a new force entered the world, a relentless, irrational hostility that would accompany us until the arrival of Moshiach.

This hatred is not merely a historical artifact. It is not confined to ancient exile or medieval blood libels. It is alive. It breathes. It mutates. It adapts to each generation’s language and technology.

The world recently marked the 81^st anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. Much has changed since those dark years. Entire institutions were built to ensure that such horrors would never return. And yet, the ancient sinah remains intact, resurfacing in new forms, under new banners, with old obsessions. Jews are mocked, judged by double standards, and vilified. The very state created as a refuge from hatred has become a magnet for it.

Anti-Semitism rises not only in Europe, but in America. Digital platforms amplify it, spread it, and normalize it. What once required mobs now needs only algorithms.

Rashi tells us that Yisro came to join the Jewish people after hearing about Krias Yam Suf and Milchemes Amaleik. The meforshim explain that these events conveyed not only how deeply Hashem loves the Jewish people, but how intensely the nations of the world oppose them. Yisro recognized the paradox at the heart of Jewish existence - to be beloved by Hashem and resisted by history. He understood that truth itself provokes opposition, and that the more transformative the truth, the more violently it is resisted.

When Albert Einstein introduced relativity, the scientific world initially mocked him. A book titled One Hundred Scientists Against Einstein appeared. When asked about it, Einstein reportedly shrugged and said, “If I were really wrong, why would one not be enough?” He understood what Jews have always known: Truth does not generate mild disagreement. It generates disproportionate fury.

From Har Sinai onward, the Jewish people have lived inside that fury.

After World War I, the League of Nations was created to ensure peace. After World War II, the United Nations rose from the ashes of Auschwitz, pledging that tyranny would never again be allowed to flourish. After 9/11, world leaders announced a new era with a global war on terror, a united front against evil.

And yet, history keeps repeating itself, not because of a lack of institutions, but because of a surplus of illusion. They did not factor in apathy. They did not factor in corruption. They did not factor in moral exhaustion. They did not factor in hatred.

Everything now moves at a blistering pace. Wars begin, fade, and are replaced before their consequences are understood. Iraq, Afghanistan, Russia, China, Iran - each crisis dissolves into the next.

The world feels unstable, yet we continue our routines as though nothing is hanging above us.

The sword is suspended - and we discuss the wallpaper.

As anti-Semitism intensifies and the old sinah resurfaces, we argue over trivialities, chase distractions, and obsess over matters of little weight. We scroll while history groans.

Perhaps, a place to begin is with what we allow into our minds and homes. Since the invention of print, ideas have traveled disguised as information. Newspapers and books have always been vehicles for more than news. They are carriers of values, assumptions, and worldviews. The Maskilim mastered this art, writing heresy in poetic Hebrew, quoting Chazal while emptying their teachings of meaning, as they mocked gedolim, rabbonim, lomdei Torah, and shomrei Torah umitzvos. Generations were torn away not by open rebellion, but by subtle infiltration.

Words are never neutral. They shape taste. They train perception. They define what feels normal.

That is why those who write, teach, and speak bear responsibility under the same command: “Aileh hamishpotim asher tosim lifneihem.” What we place before others must be honest, just, and true - a table that nourishes, not poisons.

The Alter of Kelm taught that tosim lifneihem k’shulchan aruch means that real intelligence emerges only when learning has flavor. Depth is not dryness. Wisdom is not sterile. A melamed who teaches with clarity, elegance, and taste awakens in his students not only understanding, but desire and a hunger for more.

The difference between superficial knowledge and deep understanding is the difference between eating and tasting. One sustains life. The other transforms it.

The task of man, the Alter concludes, is to become truly intelligent - not clever, not informed, but wise.

That wisdom begins with refusing to settle for shallow readings of Torah or of life. It demands that we study more deeply, interpret more honestly, and live more consciously. It requires that we understand not only what is happening around us, but also what it is asking of us.

We must speak more truthfully, treat people more carefully, and live in a way that creates kiddush Hashem rather than its opposite.

The Meshech Chochmah, in one of his classic elucidations, writes in his sefer on last week’s parsha that the Jews merited the many miracles Hakadosh Boruch Hu performed for them upon leaving Mitzrayim even though they were still entangled with avodah zorah because their middos and interpersonal conduct were refined. But in generations whose people speak lashon hora, quarrel, and act without derech eretz and sensitivity, Hashem removes His Shechinah from their midst, as He did at the time of the Second Bais Hamikdosh. Even though the people were engaged in Torah study and observance, nevertheless, because there was sinas chinom - hatred - among them, the Bais Hamikdosh was destroyed.

I saw in a new sefer by Rav Yitzchok Kolodetsky something both amazing and frightening that Rav Chaim Greineman would relate from his father, Rav Shmuel Greineman, brother-in-law of the Chazon Ish. He would say that the Chazon Ish taught that the Holocaust came about as a result of sins bein adam lachaveiro, failures in how Jews treated each other.

When we look around us, when we contemplate what is happening in the world and wonder what we can do, what is demanded of us, and how we can help draw Moshiach closer, it would do us well to ponder the message the Chazon Ish and the Meshech Chochmah sent.

Parshas Yisro, in which the Torah discusses how Klal Yisroel was presented with the gift of the Aseres Hadibros and the Torah, is followed by Parshas Mishpotim, which we study this week. By arranging the parshiyos in this way, the Torah teaches us that to maintain the lofty levels reached at Har Sinai, we must properly follow the laws of Mishpotim, which deal with interpersonal conduct.

It is not sufficient to be on a high spiritual level intellectually and theoretically. We must match that with our actions and conduct. If we cut corners financially, if we are careless with another person’s dignity, and if we are not scrupulous in ensuring that we do not harm others financially, then we are lacking in fulfilling the obligations we accepted upon ourselves at Har Sinai.

In Parshas Mishpotim, Klal Yisroel reaches its highest moment when it declares, “Na’aseh v’nishma - We will do, and later we will hear and understand.” Action before comprehension. Commitment before clarity. A nation stepping into destiny with certainty, armed and motivated by faith.

May we merit to return to that summit, to toil in Torah, taste its depth, refine our character, and hear in the background of all we do the sounds of Sinai, so that we can raise ourselves and our people and bring us closer to the geulah sheleimah bekarov b’yomeinu. Amein.

Past, Present & Future

By Rabbi Pinchos Lipschutz

Everyone needs to step away now and then. When winter tightens its grip, many northerners head south to Florida, searching for warmth and escape. Nothing against that. When I feel the need to breathe again, though, I go to Eretz Yisroel, to Yerushalayim.

That is where I feel most like myself, where the noise fades and something steadier takes its place. I don’t need much there. Even though every time I go, I make time to see a place I’ve never visited before, it is enough for me to walk Yerushalayim’s streets, worn smooth by thousands of footsteps, and watch its people go about their lives. I can do that for hours, until my feet give out and my thoughts quiet.

Last week, I returned once more. Just by standing at the Kosel, at the place from which the Shechinah has never departed, I felt recharged and was reminded why I had come. My tefillos slowed and sharpened, each word carrying more weight.

I traveled to Eretz Yisroel for what was meant to be a short visit. The plan was to spend Shabbos with my beloved mother-in-law and return on Sunday to produce the paper. Hashem had other plans, and thanks to the interference of the huge snowstorm, I did not make it back until Monday night.

Of course, everything Hashem does is for the good, and an extra, unplanned day in Yerushalayim was a gift.

Over the years, I have had the privilege of seeing much of what Yerushalayim has to offer. I have stood among the remnants of the churban haBayis, gazing at the massive stones toppled near the Kosel and the scorched city wall burned by the Romans. I have walked the very paths taken by the Bnei Yisroel in the days of the Bais Hamikdosh as they came up from Chevron and points south to be oleh regel. I have recited Tashlich at the Mayan Hashiloach, from where water was drawn for the nisuch hamayim of Sukkos and mayim chaim for parah adumah. I have stood where Dovid Hamelech is believed to have lived, moments that bring Tanach vividly to life.

Those experiences are very touching. Walking on the same path as our ancestors as they went to fulfill their obligations gives the neshomah a tingle and causes the heart to skip a few beats.

Seeing those huge stones, which comprised a strong defensive wall in the times of Nach that we study with much reverence, makes everything come alive, as does viewing the stalls that catered to the olei regel. Your imagination begins to stir as you envision millions of people standing in this very spot.

Seeing what is thought to have been the palace of Dovid Hamelech is another manifestation of bringing Dovid Hamelech alive and making everything about him so real that you can almost touch it.

And of course, there is the Kosel. Standing at the place from which the Shechinah has never departed, uttering the holy words written by Dovid Hamelech in tefillah, is always profoundly moving. As you daven Shemoneh Esrei before those eternal stones, distractions fall away and kavonah comes naturally, as it has for thousands of years.

As you daven, you feel the Shechinah nearby, and you know that He is listening to your tefillos at this special place.

All of that is deeply meaningful, but it is not what this piece is about.

This time, beyond the stones and the streets that always leave such a deep impression, the extra day afforded me the opportunity to take up an offer from my friends. Yitzchok Pindrus and Yehuda Soloveitchik took us to visit a place that, in its quiet way, embodied the same holiness and continuity I feel in Yerushalayim’s ancient walls.

We arrived at Har Tzion and learned about the extraordinary history of the area, and of the Diaspora Yeshiva located there, a yeshiva deeply tied to the Jewish presence in that part of Yerushalayim. We visited the yeshiva, which is headed by Rav Pindrus, and were given a guided tour by Rav Yitzchok Goldstein, who heads the Diaspora Yeshiva. Rav Yitzchok is a fascinating person whose life revolves around Torah and continuing the mission his father began when he took over the site after the Six Day War.

The yeshiva also maintains a Holocaust museum, the Marteif HaShoah, a place I had never visited and barely knew existed. Established by Holocaust survivors, it contains deeply moving artifacts, including the shofar that the Klausenberger Rebbe blew in the concentration camp, Sifrei Torah stained with the blood of kedoshim who were shot while holding them, and many other sacred remnants of a shattered world.

The Marteif HaShoah also contains memorial plaques, crafted like matzeivos, for the residents of 1,200 Jewish communities destroyed by the Nazis. Survivors would gather there on the yahrtzeits of their towns to say Kaddish and remember. Talmidei chachomim, including Maran Harav Shach, would learn there as a zechus for the neshamos of the martyrs. It is a hallowed place, well worth visiting when in Yerushalayim.

From there, we walked through the beauty of Har Tzion toward the Zilberman Cheder, the famous school known for its unique and remarkable method of learning based on the educational concepts of the Maharal and the Vilna Gaon.

We observed a class of five-year-old boys learning Parshas Vayeira. They were reading aloud with their rebbi, with full trup. Five-year-olds. Every boy was able to read, follow, and understand. But more than that, they knew all the pesukim from Bereishis bora until the parsha they were learning that day by heart, and they understood their meaning. They answered questions with clarity and confidence, living the words of Chazal: Ben chomeish l’mikra.

For whatever reason, most of our schools do not learn this way. Seeing it in action was astonishing, a living demonstration that children, even at a young age, are capable of absorbing and retaining Torah at a remarkably high level.

Rav Yosef Zilberman told me that the classes are not composed of geniuses. The student body reflects the same spectrum found everywhere: some very bright, some smart and some who aren’t, some average, and some weaker. But children are hungry for knowledge and are able to absorb much more than people think.

We observed older grades as well and saw the same success: boys who know Shishah Sidrei Mishnah by heart, and older ones who have learned sedorim of Shas and retain them.

It was a beautiful sight to see Bnei Yerushalayim so attached to Torah. Everyone there, from the rabbeim on down, carried a special look of satisfaction and geshmak.

The Brisker Rov would say that the true chein of Yerushalayim is not its buildings, but its children. On my “extra” day there, I felt that truth with complete clarity.

I am certain that children in chadorim throughout Yerushalayim are also blessed with tremendous chein and yedios, but this is the place we happened to see. In fact, at the home of Rav Dovid Cohen, I met my old friend, Rav Avrohom Pinzel, who heads Chochmas Shlomo, the largest cheder in Yerushalayim. He invited me to visit his school as well, something I hope to do during a future trip.

From the moment we entered the Zilberman Cheder, I was struck by the dedication, warmth, and energy that filled every corner. Walking the halls and watching children learn Torah with such enthusiasm, I felt a different kind of tingle — not the kind that comes from ancient stones, but the kind that comes from witnessing a living, breathing commitment to the future.

Here was the spirit of Yerushalayim, alive in a new generation, shaping hearts and minds in real time. It was inspiring, humbling, and deeply moving. It was a reminder that the holiness of Yerushalayim does not only live in its past, but is unfolding every day, in places like this unique yeshiva.

We traveled to the ancient city of Shiloh, where the Mishkon stood for 369 years. With the parshiyos of the Mishkon approaching, it felt like the right time to be there. I had visited once before, some fifteen years ago, before it had been developed into a formal site. Even then, it was powerful. Now, standing again on that ground, it was impossible not to feel the weight of what once stood there.

This is the place where the Mishkon itself is believed to have been situated. And nearby was the sha’ar — the gate — where Eli Hakohein is said to have been sitting when he heard the devastating words: ki nishbah Aron HaElokim — that the Pelishtim had captured the Aron. Upon hearing the news, he fell backward and was niftar.

The Novi tells us in Sefer Shmuel Alef (4) that the Bnei Yisroel were at war with the Pelishtim, and the battle was going badly. In desperation, the ziknei Yisroel sent for the Aron to be brought from Shiloh to the battlefield. It was a tragic mistake. Chofni and Pinchos, the sons of Eli who carried it, were killed, along with thirty thousand Jews. And when Eli heard what had happened, sitting at the gate opposite the Mishkon, his heart could not bear it.

To stand there — to see the site of the Mishkon and the place where Eli sat — is to feel the long, trembling story of Am Yisroel beneath your feet. The stones do not speak, but somehow they remember.

You can almost hear Shmuel Hanovi calling out across the centuries, repeating his nevuah urging the people to do teshuvah and abandon their avodah zarah. They believed they were righteous. They refused to listen. And they were punished. The war was lost and the Aron was taken.

Standing there, I found myself wondering what Shmuel would say if he were alive today. What would his message be to us? What would he be admonishing us about? What would he be urging us to fix, to strengthen and to change in order to bring the geulah closer?

We are no longer blessed with nevi’im. But we still have their words. We have Nach. We have our rabbeim. We have the sifrei mussar and machshovah written over centuries, offering us guidance, perspective, and a Torah lens through which to view our lives and our responsibilities.

In just a few weeks, we will be learning the measurements of the Mishkon. And there in Shiloh, on an ancient mountain, stands a flat area, preserved and marked, measuring one hundred amos by fifty amos, the exact size of the Mishkon. You stand there and try to imagine it: the yerios, the two mizbeichos, the crowds lining up with their korbanos, the smoke rising to the heavens in a rei’ach nichoach, the kohanim moving swiftly, purposefully, immersed in avodah. And suddenly, you realize how much we are missing in golus.

But then you look down.

Scattered everywhere are shards of pottery, fragments of the very vessels in which people once ate their korbanos, vessels that became assur b’hana’ah because of the kedusha they had absorbed. They have been lying there for thousands of years, silent witnesses to the kedusha and taharah of Yidden, exactly as Chazal depicted and described.

And in that moment, something shifts. The Mishnayos we hureved over are no longer abstract. They are no longer theoretical. They are real. Alive. Tangible. What a chizuk in emunah.

You can bend down, pick up a broken piece of clay, and suddenly, history is not something you learn.

It is something you touch.

There is so much happening in the world today — in the wider world and in our own. Some of it is good. Much of it is not. People feel unsettled, unsure of what the future holds. Anti-Semitism is rising. The specter of war with Iran hovers.

For many frum families, simply making ends meet has become an ever-growing challenge: housing, tuition, clothing, food, insurance — the basic obligations of life weigh heavier each year. Beneath it all, there is a quiet sense of division and discontent that we struggle to mend.

Where will it all lead? How will it end?

There are opportunities for chizuk all around us, and in our daily lives we can often sense Hashem’s steady hand guiding us, sustaining us, carrying us forward. But sometimes, we need a change of scenery to see it. To step outside ourselves. To be reminded — not intellectually, but viscerally — of who we are and where we come from.

Walking among ancient shards of pottery in Shiloh, standing on the stones once trodden by the olei regel, facing the remaining walls of the Bais Hamikdosh, and watching Yerushalayim’s zekeinim and ne’arim move through its streets — all of it speaks quietly but powerfully. It tells the story of eternity. It reminds us that despite everything our people have endured, we are still here. Alive. Learning. Building. Dreaming.

We walk through the streets of the Eternal City and see before our eyes the living fulfillment of the nevuah of Zechariah Hanovi: “Od yeishvu zekeinim uzekeinos b’rechovos Yerushalayim… Urechovos ha’ir yimale’u yeladim v’yelados mesachakim b’rechovoseha.”

We stand in a city that was destroyed, emptied, burned and mourned, and now we see old people sitting peacefully along the streets and children playing in them.

And in that vision, we find our answer. Not to every question, but to the deepest one of all. We are not a people of endings. We are a people of continuity.

Other nations write histories that conclude with a rise and a fall, with glory followed by disappearance. Our story is quite different. For us, Am Yisroel, destruction is never the final word. Golus is never the last chapter. The dark moments become bridges to something good that follows each time.

That is what Yerushalayim teaches us when we walk its streets.

Am Yisroel exists in a story whose final word has not yet been written. And the story won’t end, as most stories do, with “The End,” but rather with “The Geulah.”

May we merit to see and experience it speedily in our days. Amein.