"Speedily in Our Days..." Tisha B'Av 5779, 2019

This year, this Tisha b'Av, the time we're supposed to be mourning the destruction of our Holy Temples, I find myself mourning the fact that the vast majority of the Jewish People have no plan to build the Third Holy Temple. 

As I read the words of Eicha, I began to feel that we're too accepting of our "victimhood," rather than pushing forward and living as Gd wants. Much of this feeling is the influence of the lectures I heard the other day in Michlelet Herzog (College) Tanach/Bible Program.

Only seventy 70 years passed between the destruction of the First Temple and the construction of the Second Temple. Now over two thousand years have passed since the Second one was destroyed, and  we still don't have a Holy Temple. More than seventy 70 years ago the State of Israel was established and more than fifty years since the IDF Israel Defense Forces liberated the Temple Mount in the stupendously miraculous 1967 Six Days War.

Just a few hours ago, on Shabbat we read the Torah, Dvarim:

Dvarim I

רְ֠אֵה נָתַ֨ן יְ-ה אֱלֹ-יךָ לְפָנֶ֖יךָ אֶת־הָאָ֑רֶץ עֲלֵ֣ה רֵ֗שׁ כַּאֲשֶׁר֩ דִּבֶּ֨ר יְ-ה אֱלֹהֵ֤י אֲבֹתֶ֙יךָ֙ לָ֔ךְ אַל־תִּירָ֖א וְאַל־תֵּחָֽת׃

21- See, the LORD your God has placed the land at your disposal. Go up, take possession, as the LORD, the God of your fathers, promised you. Fear not and be not dismayed.”

Nu? It's clear to me. We're supposed to be sovereign and build for the Jewish People in all of the Land of Israel, including the Holy Temple, the Beit Hamikdash on Har Habayit, the Temple Mount.

• Gd gave us this Land for a reason.
• Gd gave us the victories in 1948, 1967, 1973 and more for us to build a country for Jews.

We must not be afraid of foreign powers. They have no power over us. We the Jewish People are Gd's People.

May we accept Gd's gifts and use them properly

במהרה בימינו

Bimhaira yameinu

Speedily in Our Days

Summer Bible/Tanach 5779 at Herzog College

Yesterday I spent the day immersed in Bible, Tanach at Michlelet Herzog, Herzog College in Alon Shvut. They offer a weeklong "festival" of study and touring. It's not cheap, but it's worth it for me. My summer vacation treats are membership in our local pool and spending one day at Herzog. I prefer that to a hotel or other "vacation."

This year enough* people signed up for the Shomron-Binyamin bus, which made traveling very easy.
I signed up for lectures according to the lecturers. Three are favorites from Matan, Dr. Yael Ziegler, Yael Leibowitz and Atara Snowbell, who no longer teaches there. They are my all time favorites, and if you ever have the opportunity to hear them, take advantage.

Herzog College Yemei Iyun, Bible Study Days offer classes and tours in Hebrew, English and French.

The organization, as usual, was excellent. This time my classes were only in two locations, two lectures, lunch and then the following three in a large "tent." Besides the bus, I signed up for lunch, which was also excellent. There was fish, plus a vegetarian alternative, lots of vegetables, salad, fruit and bread for those who wanted. There were hot/cold drinks in various locations, plus fruit, cookies and pastry throughout the day.

I must admit that the various lectures are all mixed up in my head. They covered similar overlapping topics and even quoted some of the same Bible verses.

To very superficially summarize, the lectures were about the era between the two Holy Temples, Ezra, Nechemia and Jeremiah.

Each of the five lecturers/speakers have different styles, and I really enjoyed the fact that they went over similar subject matter in their individual ways. The era is so similar to today:

• aliyah
• intermarriage
• assimilation
• "Who's a Jew?"
• To build or not to build a new Holy Temple?
• True or False Prophets? Who's really speaking in the name of Gd?

An added bonus was seeing lots of friends, many I've known since I was a teen. I also got to meet people I've been in touch with via facebook and other social media.

The growing popularity of the Tanach, Bible is further proof that we're preparing ourselves for the Third Temple and the Moshiach. They are connected, and I believe that we have to change, be ready, prepare ourselves and the world. It's not the job for the Moshiach to change us.  Gd willing we will work harder to make ourselves better, do Teshuva, repent and utilize the gifts Gd has been giving us, like the Land of Israel.

במהרה בימינו

bimhaira biyameinu

speedily in our days...

*last year it was cancelled for the day I needed due to insufficient registration

Enjoying a Day of Tanach/Bible at Herzog

For my summer treat, I signed up for a day at Michlelet Herzog, Herzog College's Tanach/Bible Yom Iyun. It's not cheap, and next year I may try a different program.

But I must admit that some of my favorite Tanach teachers are at Herzog, and I like the fact that I can study in both Hebrew and English. OK most classes I sign up for are in English. When you're dealing with five challenging and information filled lectures in one day choosing native tongue is a wise decision.  It's much easier to absorb the material.

To be perfectly honest, there were times I not only couldn't follow, but I even dozed off. But please remember that I had spent the day before at Kenes Shiloh, which not only was full of lectures until late at night, but began with a tour/hike in the hot sun.

I'm glad that I went to Herzog, even though I wasn't the ideal student. FYI the shiurim/lectures will be posted on their site. I plan on listening to them over and over. That way I'll really get my money's worth.

If you attended, what was your experience?

Summer Treat, Bible Tanach at Herzog

This is cross-posted on Israel Blogger.

Yesterday, along with hundreds or most probably thousands of others, I spent the whole day learning Tanach, Bible at Michlelet Herzog in Alon Shvut.

People came from all over Israel to attend, and classes were in two languages, Hebrew and English. Considering the amount of English heard in the hallways, WC and cafeteria, I'd say that many English speakers attended classes in Hebrew.  There was an amazing range of choices in lectures, and most people had preregistered, so the organizers knew in which sized rooms the lectures should be. Most people also paid for lunch, which was plentiful and efficiently served. And there was also an option to take buses, which even had a stop in Shiloh. Yes, that's how I traveled.

I only attended one day of the classes, but I have many friends who were there for more. Considering that there were five scheduled classes in just one day, I'd expect to fade long before the day was over. But thanks to the perfect temperature air-conditioning, spritz humidifiers outdoors, perfectly timed breaks between lessons and the unlimited hot/cold drinks available, I remained awake and alert the entire day.

Of the five classes I took, the highlights were Yehuda, "The Making of a Hero" by Rabbi Alex Israel, "An Unnatural Fault Line: Jerusalem," by Rabbi Moshe Shulman, and Dr. Yael Ziegler's "Our Father, Our King: The Difference Between Shirat Hayam and Shirat Haazinu."

These were lectures, not discussions, and frequently I had to bite my tongue to keep from trying to dialogue with the speaker. This was much less a problem with Yael Ziegler who is an expert in giving such a complete and brilliantly planned Bible Tanach lesson, which inspires and informs, rather than leaving me with a host of unanswered questions.

Rabbi Alex Israel stepped into the usual mistake of presuming modern family modes and values for the time of Yehuda and Tamar. I find that worse than annoying. Marriage in the time of the Bible was not like modern time at all. To me it's very obvious that Tamar's marriage to Yehuda's eldest son, Er, had nothing to do with "love." There was some business or political decision between her clan and Yehuda's. His sons, who as Israel did point out, were most probably too young to understand their role and cooperate by having children with her. But, as I see it, Tamar did understand the importance of having a family with Yehuda's clan, and that's why she took the daring step of disguising herself as a prostitute and seducing Yehuda. Disguises and daring women were very common threads in the David and Messianic line. Think of Ya'akov and Leah. Ya'akov disguised himself as his brother to fool his father to get the main inheritance instead of his brother, and then Leah tricked him, pretending that he was marrying her sister Rachel. These are points I had wanted to mention if it had been "that sort of lecture." But there was no time for questions and dialogues. 

Rabbi Moshe Shulman's topic was totally new for me. I hadn't thought about the idea that the "political" Yehuda and Yisrael split predated the King Solomon's descendants. Rabbi Shulman used the tribal maps to simplify the geography of the split, which caused me to want to ask what happened to the Tribe of Shimon, Simon, which was in the area of Yehuda. Yes, that's one of my "dumb questions."  Besides that, I quickly saw something that the tribes of Yehuda and Binyamin had in common, which Shulman didn't mention at all. It almost reminded me of Korach...  Both those tribes had members anointed as kings by Shmuel Hanavi, as instructed by Gd. Actually, I was disappointed that Shulman didn't mention it. The rivalry between the sons of Rachel and Leah is depicted many times in the Bible, but here we see them united against the sons of the concubines and their other brothers.

I really like it when a Bible lecture inspires me to ask lots of questions, but when it's not a framework that allows discussion, at least I have my blog, and I will send them this link. Bli neder, can't promise, I will post answers if I receive them. All lectures should be on the Herzog site at some point.