By the Grace of G-d
Dear Friend,
I’m still quite inspired from the events of this week!
The kids, all twelve of them plus their coach, are out.
Why am I so inspired?
Firstly, because Hashem showed us His Divine Providence.
From beginning to end. Literally.
The NY Times story (quoted in my post of last Friday) spoke about the miraculous way that the boys were found by a British diver whose rope ended exactly where the boys were.
That’s the miraculous beginning.
What happened at the end is no less miraculous.
This Wall Street Journal headline says it all:
The Thai Cave Rescue, Before Its Triumph, Teetered on the Brink of Disaster
Her is a short excerpt from the article:
Tuesday, shortly after the group inside the deepest cavern had been pulled to safety, a piece of equipment that drained water to levels that made the escape manageable broke. Without the pump, torrential rains that night sent water levels soaring through the cave.
“It’s lucky we completed our mission yesterday, because the cave is covered by water again today,” Royal Thai Navy SEAL commander Rear Admiral Arpakorn Yookongkaew said on Wednesday.
The Thai Navy Seals Facebook page had a quote: “We are not sure if this is a miracle, a science, or what. All the thirteen Wild Boars are now out of the cave”.
Whether or not the NYT, WSJ or Thai Navy Seals prefer to use the lukewarm word ‘lucky’ or they have the temerity to actually rightfully proclaim this event a miracle of G-d, the writing is on the wall. Everything that could go right went right. Against all odds. Thank G-d.
To me, this is called a miracle. Witnessing a miracle unfold before your eyes, in an age where we have ‘virtual eyes’ that take us to the actual scene of the miracle, is hugely inspiring!
Actually, it’s not all that often that Hashem lets us get a glimpse into a world of G-dly revelation. Miraculous phenomena were commonplace in the Temple of yore. It is this revelatory G-dly state that we mourn during these Three Weeks.
One of my colleagues just wrote a nice post on this topic.
On the Jewish calendar, this time-period is called “the three weeks”, a period of mourning the destruction of the “Beit Hamikdash”, the holy temple that stood in Jerusalem.
To say that we are mourning only the loss of a structure made out of bricks will be over simplistic. In fact, we are mourning what was “inside” of those walls, the divine presence that was revealed to anyone who stepped foot in the temple.
Take, for example, the Mishna, in ethics of our fathers, detailing the “ten miracles were performed for our forefathers in the Holy Temple”. One of the miracles was “The rains did not extinguish the wood-fire burning upon the altar”. Now that is quite a miracle. You walk into the temple in the midst of a thunderstorm and pouring rain, yet the fire continues to burn. Or the miracle of “no man ever said to his fellow "My lodging in Jerusalem is too cramped for me” – I mean, so many Jews gather together and not even one complains? That’s unheard of!
When the Mikdash was destroyed, all of it was gone. No more clear, revealed divine presence. No more undeniable G-d’s existence. We entered a period of “exile”, a period that while we might witness some unusual events, we still might question and doubt if it is, indeed, a miracle. Click here to read the full post).
The bigger surprise, and what is even more exciting is the way that humanity acted in such a noble, virtuous and moral way during this ordeal.
This rescue operation brought out the best in so many people.
Amazingly, in the common goal of saving these lives, differences were forgotten. Language barriers didn’t interfere. Religious orientation notwithstanding, everyone rallied around the primary belief in the sanctity of life.
What I hear in the ebullient outpouring of joy that has spread across the world, are the words of King David in Tehillim (Psalms) 117:
PRAISE HASHEM ALL THE NATIONS… FOR HE HAS BROUGHT POWERFUL KINDNESS UPON US. HASHEM IS TRUE FOR EVER. PRAISE HASHEM!
Let us take this inspiration and use it for the purpose it is given.
G-d shows us these glimpses of His presence to inspire us to be more conscious of our moral duties.
At Mt Sinai some three thousand three hundred years ago, G-d gave us a roadmap for life. The Torah and its 613 commandments. It hasn’t changed. Just like G-d hasn’t changed.
Living a life of Torah based morality (Mitzvahs), is the best recipe for a happy and meaningful life.
There are no shortcuts. You sometimes even have to swim against the current (as the cave divers did). But it is well worth the effort.
You will never know how wonderful it is till you try it! You may have to go a bit deeper than you’ve been till now (if they wouldn’t have gone deeper into the cave they would never have found those boys).
So what are you waiting for? For tomorrow?
You never know if tomorrow you will have the same opportunity. To paraphrase the Thai Navy Seal commander: “It’s lucky we completed our mission yesterday’, because the cave is covered by water again today,
As our sages said it ) Ethics of our fathers 2,4) ‘don’t say when I have time I will study, perhaps you will never have time’.
NOW is the time!
Shabbat Shalom
Rabbi Yosef Kantor