The only advice
On Shabbat, I was reading a bit more of the Kochavi Or book in Hebrew, telling more accounts of Rabbenu’s dealings with the maskilim in Uman.
One of the stories really caught my eye.
It was after Rebbe Nachman had passed away, and Breslov chassidut – and Rav Natan Sternhertz in particular – were going through awful persecution from ‘big tzaddikim’ – chassidic Rebbes! – who were literally trying to kill them.
One night, they sent an assassin to Breslov.
Except, the assassin broke into the house of ‘R Natan Apotekker’ in Breslov, instead of R’ Natan Sternhartz, and murdered the man and all his family while they slept in their beds.
When this became known, Hirsch Ber Horowitz, one of the leading maskilim in Uman who had tight links with the Russian government and who played chess with Rabbenu before he died, came to Rav Natan with an offer.
He told him, just give me the word, and I’ll write a letter. Within 24 hours, no trace of your persecutors will remain…
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R Natan told him: I would rather be the one being persecuted, than be ‘the persecutor’.
There is a spiritual rule, that God aligns Himself with the ones who are persecuted – even when they otherwise don’t have a lot of good deeds or good character traits to show for themselves.
R Natan then also told Hirsch Ber:
I have no other etzot (advice) – except for prayer!
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Even though I am still doing my best to avoid as much ‘fear porn’ news as possible, it’s impossible to not know about anything, especially those things that are happening in Israel itself.
So yes, I do know there was another very strange double murder in Huwara on Shabbat, and there are things about that murder that don’t add up to me at all.
Like, why someone would drive over 100km from Ashdod – on the Southern coast – to Huwara – central-North – to fix their car.
I know Palestinian mechanics tend to be much cheaper, and to do a good job – but there a bunch of cheap Palestinian mechanics in the Gush, too, which is much closer to Ashdod.
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And I also don’t get what other ‘errands’ they were meant to be running in Huwara on Shabbat for hours, nor why they would get their car cleaned before they headed back over 100+km on a dusty road back to Ashdod.
Lots of things don’t make sense to me.
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And, I also know there was another shooting attack on the roads near Hevron yesterday, that apparently killed a woman.
As much as I would love to filter all this out, I just can’t.
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And the last thing I know at the moment, is that the ‘usual suspects’ – all those ‘dati leumi’ figures who really do just work for the government – are now calling on ‘the settlers’ to rise up and basically begin a violent civil war, in the name of ‘self defense’.
Some of the people calling for this literally sit in the government, and apparently are in charge of ‘security’….
Meanwhile, under the watch of this fantastic ‘right wing’ government, the security situation has just gone from bad to worse – because that’s the whole point.
To give everyone such yeoush, such despair about the pointless political situation here and elsewhere that we either sink into total apathy and give up – or get angry and violent.
Either would suit them fine, but the last one is what they are particularly hoping for, because then they can declare martial law and take over the country officially, with a proper pretext.
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The Rav has been talking a lot the last couple of weeks about how David refused to wear armor, when he went to fight Goliath, because he wanted to have the miracles.
And the miracles wouldn’t come, if he was doing even minimum things like ‘wearing armor’, the way he was supposed to.
You think we can successfully fight these ‘Goliaths’ of our day, according to their rules?
Do you really think there is any political system in the world that is not totally rigged and under their control? Any political candidate who they would let get the top jobs, if they weren’t totally under the thumb of ‘the machine’?
We can’t fight this Goliath derech hateva.
The only advice is prayer.
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To be honest, I have more than mild apprehension about what the next few months are going to bring.
I am trying very hard to carry on living life regardless, and to just carry on praying and trying to do good deeds, and trying to re-focus on the Torah more, and Rabbenu’s teachings, and Rav Berland’s words, because they seem like the best use of my precious time and headspace right now.
It could be, they will try another plandemic soon.
It could be, we’ll wake up to a fake alien invasion one of these mornings.
Or another war.
Or some other totally manufactured situation to keep us all stuck in ‘fear’ mode, and far away from God.
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God forbid, any of that happens.
But if it does, I will try to deal with it at the time, in the best way I can.
And in the meantime….the only advice is prayer.
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You might also like this article:
Is where Rav Berland is talking about David online?
I was talking, briefly, with Rabbi Yissachar Berg’s attendant (my friend) about Hurricane Hilary, and how all this comes from the government on a physical level, but comes from God ultimately (and only).
Indeed, amen.
not yet – BH I’ll translate it and put it up.
Rivka, you and the readers don’t have to read my account of the pigua from yesterday. But I felt compelled to write about it for the following reasons:
*The man who was driving is the son of friends of my husband and me from my neighborhood. These friends helped us a lot when we first made aliyah. Please pray for Aryeh Leib ben Ella, who is facing surgery and a somewhat complicated recovery.
*I needed to express my alarm and dismay at, all of a sudden, politicians (the same ones who either didn’t comment or else spoke badly about, and allowed injustice to prevail over, the likes of Ahuvya Sandak, zz”l, and Amiram Ben-Uliel, shlita) feeling *very badly* for the little girl who saw her mother be murdered. These very people could have prevented that, and many others, by not calling those who live in Judea and Samaria the enemy and not treating them as such, over the period from 1967 until now, and continuing. I’m sure your kids have lots of stories.
*It was all over the news here in Israel, even on Haaretz, which wouldn’t let me read the article because I run an ad blocker and won’t subscribe to that fish wrapping! My husband saw it on BBC, of all places, too.
*My Torah classes were affected. The head rabbanit of Machon Roni (women’s division of Diaspora Yeshiva) was delayed on the road leading up to the pigua site, along with the eldest daughter, the one who takes care of her the most. She is approaching 90 years old, next year IIRC, be”H. Our class with her was late because of it, and she is the grand finale of the day, every Sheni (Monday). I found out about the terrorist attack from another friend in the ‘hood who feels my prayers are pure and she needed to contact me specifically; TG, class was just ending at the time!
https://havahaaharona.blogspot.com/2023/08/are-we-mourning-our-dead-in.html
Thanks for sharing it Hava – I’m not against real outpourings of feelings on the blog, and it’s also very important.
I’m just trying to stay away from being manipulated by ‘fake news’. You’re definitely not in that category.
Thank you, Rivka, for clarifying that. I’m sure you’ll get more outpourings, and not only from me!
Hava, if you want to read paywalled articles, go to https://archive.is/ and use it to view the page. Works for many sites, and a copy is preserved for posterity even when the original site modifies or scraps the article.
Thank you, Shimshon! I backed up my blog there (maybe I shouldn’t have done that? Can I take it down from there if I made a mistake?) and did Haaretz there. Finally saw the article. But I won’t share this with anyone until I find out just what the limits are.
There is no deleting copies. There are no imposed limits, but the site is private and privately supported. It will last as long as the funding allows.
I’m even more upset by those politicians who poured on the syrupy statements at the beginning, now that I, and now you, know that Batsheva’s daughter who was in the car with her and Aryeh is 12 years old, not six as we’d been told. Did they lie to us, or did they just not know? Because what they did was a sloppy attempt at trying to make up for TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE.
This daughter gave a hesped at the funeral. I made the correction in the article linked above and connected to the video, on Pulse of Israel:
https://pulseofisrael.com/2023/08/22/daughter-eulogizes-mother/
Baruch Dayan HaEmet…..Something very strange….. the surname of father and son murdered in Huwara : Nigreker….. and the surname of the lady murdered in Hevron: Nigri…. ???
I am still emailing with Efraim Palvanov, because he knows much about the questions I have.
I still have that feeling, “He’s very smart, so he must have a point regarding the ’14 billion years evolution.'”
If I ask him what his ‘Torah source’ is for that (evolution), should I comment it on this blog? I imagine with one who has a ‘Torah source,’ I as a non-Jew can’t say too much regarding it.
First, a believing non-Jew beats an apikorus Jew any time, just as a general observation, not related to anyone specific…
Sure, you can post the Torah source for that statement.
I’m pretty sure it doesn’t exist – at all – but I’d be very happy to see it, if it does.
Also – can you ask him what his degrees are actually in, and when he completed his studies in university?
I can’t find that information anywhere.