Shalom my friends, this is Simcha Hochbaum of Hebron, standing here in the ancient synagogue of Avraham Avinu. We are coming off of the days of Purim, a very different Purim this year. No major parties, and no getting together. But yet at the same time it was a much deeper experience.
The Talmud tells us if one reads the Megillah out of order, he doesn’t fulfill his obligation. The students of the Baal Shem Tov say on הקורא את המגילה למפרע, if you read the Megilla as a story of the past, if you don’t try to identify with the story and find yourself in that story, one does not fulfill his obligation.
This year, more than ever, when we read the story of Haman’s evil plot to wipe out and annihilate the Jewish people, it was so easy to identify as we heard missiles being shot from Iran and constant sirens bringing the Jewish people to run to bomb shelters.
At the beginning there was fear, trepidation and anxiety, but there’s also something that happens to you on Purim when one’s in the middle of that seuda on Purim, that great feast, and he’s intoxicated with God’s oneness and he’s on that level of Ad Lo Yada that his mind is beyond comprehension.
All of a sudden you don’t hear sirens that bring you to fear and anxiety, but you can hear the sound of the shofar of Moshiach, that sound of the great geula.
We should be privileged this Shabbat כי תשא את ראש בני ישראל God lifts up the head of the Jewish people.
Sometimes when down in the bomb shelter it could be scary but when we’re in an elated state of simcha and joy, you can hear the great, great sound of moshiach, the sound of geula and the siren pronouncing and proclaiming the great, great day.
We should all be privileged this Shabbat to turn any sadness, any anxiety, to turn that into great, great, simcha, to see the real V’nahafoch Hu and the ultimate, ultimate turning around with the Jewish nation being victorious over all the enemies.
