Category — Shmos

Answer: They both should take less than 18 minutes!

***

It is really hot outside. Hot like a desert.

There are hundreds of people out there in the fields, wrapped in rags, with ripped sandals on their aching feet. They walk haggardly, the whiplash marks painted all over their broken bodies. To the side stands the guard, a dark-skinned man with an interesting-looking beard.

Stop for a moment and imagine the scene. Enter Egypt of 3300 years ago.

Now make use of your imaginary Photoshop program, and insert yourself into the picture. From now on, you will be experiencing the drama along with the others. You will try to feel their pain and plight.

Ready? Let’s continue.

You notice one of your co-workers collapsing. He is blue.

You don’t cry; you are already immune to pain, having lived this nightmare for the last seventy years. Life is painful.

When the guard walks over to the dead man, you have a brief moment to think undisturbed. Your mind begins to wander…

You remember the time your daddy sat you on his lap and related what had been told to him by his father, quoting the patriarch of the family: A day would come when a man would arise and declare in the name of G-d, “I have surely remembered you!” Then all the suffering would end…

Whip! GET TO WORK! The guard is back. Back to reality!

Back to work you go, but with a flicker of hope. The future you see so vividly revives your shattered soul. It is all about to end, you tell yourself with pure faith.

BOOM!

Hey, what’s the noise I hear? Why is everyone shouting?

You raise your eyes and behold a dream come true.

There stands a man with an angelic look, with a long white beard and eyes so kind you forget your troubles. And he is shouting for all to hear, “G-d has said: ‘I have surely remembered you!’”

Moses is in town. Welcome.

*

Now close Photoshop. Go back to the exile of America 2008.

No whips, no guards, but an exile of a different sort – a prison of secularism and lack of Divine revelation.

BOOM!

Hey, what’s that noise I hear? Why is everyone shouting?

You raise your eyes and behold a dream come true.

There stands a man with an angelic look, with a long white beard and eyes so kind you feel the truth penetrating your soul. And he is shouting for all to hear, “The time of your redemption has arrived!”

Moshiach is in town.

Welcome.

Josh was hurrying out of a business meeting. Absorbed in the recently-concluded discussion, he did not realize that the sidewalk was covered in fresh snow. Before he knew it, he lost control of his balance and slipped.
Just before landing on the pavement, he was spotted by a kind passerby who ran out of nowhere, grabbed him, and helped him regain his balance.
“Thank you so much!” Josh thanked his savior. “My pleasure,” said the man, and he waved his hand goodbye.
As the man’s hand was raised, Josh noticed an interesting pin attached to his jacket’s inside pocket which read: The house of the children of Satan.
“Excuse me sir,” Josh turned to the stranger. “May I ask you a question?”
“Sure!”
“Are you a member of the children of Satan?”
“Yes I am!”
“BBBBBut you are so nice….!”
“Oh, I’m not religious….”
* * *
The future of Judaism was and is of major concern to many. A new study recently published suggests that 48% of Jews marry out of the faith. And the numbers are just growing, they say.
Shocking it isn’t. Only 17% of Jews in New York, the most Jewish state, study in Jewish schools. One can hardly blame those of us who decide to be the last in the long golden chain, cutting their children from their heritage. After all, they know no better.
“Let us be Jews in our homes and gentiles out on the street,” said the new immigrants to the “Goldene Medina” (golden land) as they arrived at Ellis Island.
At home they continued speaking Yiddish, watched Molly Picon, and tried to give their children a taste of Judaism through Fiddler on the Roof. Unfortunately, many of their sons and daughters followed in the footsteps of Tevye the Milkman’s children. Assimilation became the norm, and a spiritual Holocaust has been going on ever since.
In over fifty years, we have barely grown by ten percent; sad, very sad.
During these upcoming weeks, we will read in the Torah about the slavery in Egypt and the Exodus. In just over two hundred years, the Jewish nation grew from a family of seventy to a nation of two million! That’s a feat!
Our sages taught that the Jews foresaw what would happen when their children would grow in number, and start befriending the cultured Egyptians. They were realistic enough to know that it was inevitable, so they asked his children to promise them that they would hold on to four principles which would assure their survival as a nation:
1. Not to modernize their names
2. Not to change their dress code
3. Not to change their language
4. Not to intermarry
Realizing that the survival of a people depends on its culture, they instituted pride and dignity into the people. For when Yaakov is modernized to Jason; when the Kippa is changed to a baseball cap; when Yiddish is a language for those with side locks to their bellies – then we don’t have much chance of making it through more then a few generations.
And that philosophy has been proven over and over again throughout the generations. History speaks for itself, vividly portraying that had our grandparents renounced their unique identity, there would be no Jewish nation today. Look at the leaders of all the modern movements that branched out of authentic Judaism. Where are their descendants today?
The Jewish nation is alive because of the old timers and young ones going to synagogue three times a day to pray, not despite them.
History is our witness. You are the proof.