When Mashiach Comes, Everyone Will Return
At the beginning of World War I, Rav Yissachar Dov of Belz found refuge in the city of Ratzfert in Hungary. A chaburah of talmidei chachamim formed around the Rebbe. The head of the chaburah was Rav Moshe Dovid Teitelbaum, av beis din of Laposh and a grandson of the Yitav Lev.
Rav Moshe Dovid gave a drashah to the chaburah. “Bnei Yisrael are suffering, and they must do teshuvah,” he declared. He then turned to Rav Yissachar Dov and said, “Belzer Rav, if you will inspire the community to teshuvah, it will help them repent fully and merit a complete redemption.” His drashah went on for almost an hour.
When he concluded, the Belzer Rav turned to him and said, “Laposher Rav, have you concluded your arguments? If Mashiach arrives, Bnei Yisrael will automatically do teshuvah. The most important factor is for Bnei Yisrael to love each other. Each of us has to love even the worst Jew as he loves himself. We must unify all of our hearts and distance anything that may divide our hearts. This is what the yeshuah of Klal Yisrael depends on in times of trouble.”
This principle can be found in all of the sifrei Chassidus. There may be many imperfections among the Jewish people that must be repaired by teshuvah, but when Mashiach arrives, everyone will be chozer b’teshuvah and every blemish will disappear. The real problem is that Mashiach can’t come as long as the hearts of the Jewish people are divided. When we love each other, he will come.
Eliyahu Comes Only to Increase Shalom
The Mishnah (Eiduyos 8:7) clearly states, שלום להרבות אלא בא אליהו אין בעולם – Eliyahu comes only to increase peace in the world. Eliyahu precedes Mashiach because only when we reach a state of shalom will Mashiach arrive. Once he arrives, all will be repaired.
The Midrash (Aggadas Bereishis 8:7) states: “In Olam Hazeh, because they don’t unite, they are jealous of each other. As long as they remain divided, they continue to descend. In the future, they will unite and become elevated. Hakadosh Baruch Hu will say, ‘You have united; I will rise up together with you.’”
Jealousy stems from division. If people loved each other, they would rejoice in what others have and in their success, rather than feeling jealous. Chazal say that one is not jealous of his son or student. There are many true stories of talmidim who grew greater than their rav, to the delight of the rav. Countless parents are happy and proud when their children surpass them and become famously successful.
Rav Moshe Zilberberg said, “When I was a child, they called me ‘the grandson of the Pittsburgher Rav.’ When I got married, they started to call me ‘the grandson of Rav Gedaliah Schorr.’ When my son (Rav Tzvi Meir Zilberberg) became known, they began to call me ‘the father of Rav Tzvi Meir.’”
This is the natural ayin tovah that comes from love and a feeling of connection.
Does Everything Really Depend on Ahavas Yisrael?
This concept requires further study. One would think the Jewish people are plagued with issues that are far more damaging than a lack of ahavas Yisrael. Yet the sources teach us that everything depends on ahavas Yisrael. How can we understand this?
We can ask the same question from another angle. Chazal teach us that the second Beis Hamikdash was destroyed because of sinas chinam, baseless hatred. Aren’t there more serious transgressions than sinas chinam? Chazal’s statement certainly reinforces the idea that had there been love and unity among the Jewish people, even if they were guilty of terrible aveiros, the Beis Hamikdash would not have been destroyed; only the lack of love and unity led to its destruction. Why is this so?
The recurrence of this question helps us realize that we are not seeing things from a Torah perspective. But in order to change our perceptions, we must first understand the underlying concepts. Indeed, one of the key aspects of Torah study is transforming the way we look at things. A person who comes to learn Torah must ask himself if his goal is to find backing for his hashkafah, or if he wants to hear the hashkafah of the Torah.
When approached by a poor man for tzedakah, we may ask, “Why must I give him money? He doesn’t deserve it.” We need to open a Chumash and read (Devarim 15:10): לוֹ בְ ּ תִ תְ ּ ךָ לְ בָ בְ ךָ יֵ רַ ע וְ לֹא – Your heart should not feel bad when you give to him.
A person may say, “I enjoy davening alone. Why should Hakadosh Baruch Hu care if I have nine other people davening with me or not?” Once again, we ask this Jew if he wants to assert his hashkafah or if he wants to hear the hashkafah of the Torah. The Torah’s hashkafah is that the Shechinah only dwells in a gathering of ten men.
Learning Torah enables us to change the way we see the world as we adopt the Torah’s definitions of what is major and what is minor, more important and less important, primary and secondary.
The Torah’s hashkafah regarding the Beis Hamikdash is quite clear: It cannot stand if Jewish hearts are divided. Galus and geulah are dependent on Klal Yisrael’s level of ahavas Yisrael. You can go on and on about teshuvah and countless wrongs that need to be rectified, but without ahavas Yisrael, it simply won’t help.
Another Puzzling Midrash
In the Midrash (Devarim Rabbah Shoftim 10) we find,
R. Shmuel bar Nachman said, “The generation of Achav were idolaters, yet when they went out to war, they were victorious. Why? Because there were no talebearers among them. When Izevel wanted to kill all of the prophets of Hashem, what did Ovadiah do? He hid them, and no one told Achav, ‘This is what Ovadiah did.’
“But in the generation of Shaul, they were all talebearers. When Shaul pursued Dovid, everyone told him lashon hara [about Dovid].... Therefore, they were defeated in their battles.”
This is a shocking midrash. Achav’s generation worshiped avodah zarah, yet emerged victorious in war! It is clear that the Shechinah leaves Klal Yisrael when lashon hara is prevalent, when Jewish hearts are divided. When their hearts are united, they succeed.
But what about the terrible sin of avodah zarah? you may argue. Once again, you must ask yourself if you want to learn Hakadosh Baruch Hu’s hashkafah. If you honestly want to see the world through the lens of Torah, you will learn that even when idolatry is prevalent, as long as there is unity, the Beis Hamikdash can continue to exist.
A Small Mistake that Spells Disaster
The Torah clearly views the sins of idolatry, forbidden relations and murder as the most serious of all transgressions. These three aveiros are the only times a Jew is required to give up his life rather than transgress. If so, how can we say that everything depends on ahavas Yisrael and not on the tikkun of the most serious aveiros?
Apparently, there is a paradox we must resolve to help us comprehend the idea that our ability to have the Beis Hamikdash depends on ahavas Yisrael.
Among the forces that Hakadosh Baruch Hu put in place to govern our world, we find the power of gravity. Not long ago, a tall building in Florida collapsed, and unfortunately many people were killed. Certainly, Hashem is sending us a message with this event (as we will soon explain), but there is also an external explanation for the physical event. One oversight, one tiny mistake of an engineer, led to the catastrophe. Similarly, if a pilot forgot to press one button, or if one item was overlooked during the pre-flight check, an airplane can crash, killing hundreds of people. It seems out of proportion. We understand that it’s possible to kill multiple people with a gun or a knife. But we have difficulty accepting that a small oversight can lead to a great disaster.
Even though every event is decreed from above by Hakadosh Baruch Hu, we need to understand the systems that Hakadosh Baruch Hu created in His world.
There Are Rules!
It’s a simple fact that Olam Hazeh has rules. If someone acts in a way that conflicts with those rules, the result can be disastrous. After the fact, no apology can turn back the clock. Regret can’t reverse the repercussions. Once we learn that this is the way of the world, we also learn not to try to outsmart the system. Attempting to do so will inevitably lead us to regret our actions.
There are far fewer airplane accidents than car accidents. The reason for that is precisely because pressing the wrong button can cause the death of all the passengers. If people want to travel rapidly from one country to another, they must utilize a means of transport where one small mistake can result in catastrophe. Therefore, from the earliest days of long-distance air travel, protective measures were put in place to prevent that small mistake. They designed planes with two engines, so that if one fails it remains possible to fly with the other. They implemented laws, restrictions and safety procedures, with one fail-safe after another — because they knew they had no choice. The alternative was unacceptable.
Despite it all, since human beings aren’t perfect, airplanes have crashed. When that happens, there is an immediate and thorough investigation, and all planes of that type are grounded until the cause of the crash is identified.
From Physical to Spiritual
In Parshas Bo, the Ohr Hachaim Hakadosh explains that Hashem wants us to learn lessons from the laws of nature that will help us understand the workings of the spiritual world. He uses the example of a magnet to help people understand how sparks of kedushah are drawn to kedushah. That magnetism is why the arrival of a tzaddik in a certain location causes all of the nitzotzos of kedushah in that place to be drawn to him as metal is drawn to a magnet.
The physical world is a constricted yet parallel form of the spiritual world. That is why we can learn much about ruchniyus by observing the workings of the physical world. Hakadosh Baruch Hu knew that if we had to discuss spirituality in its own terms, we wouldn’t be capable of understanding it. He therefore gave us tangible examples in the physical world, which we can see and understand, that help us visualize the workings of the spiritual world.
What can we learn from the example of the airplane? We learn that some aspects of the spiritual world leave us no room for error, and we must set up one safeguard after another to ensure that we don’t run against those laws of spiritual nature. Crossing one of those lines will bring disaster, and it won’t help to say we didn’t know or that we are sorry and will try harder next time.
Imagine how we would take the apologies of an engineer, a pilot or an airplane technician. “I was so busy that day; my daughter was getting married; I simply forgot. I’m really sorry the building collapsed, but what can I do, I’m human. I’ll try to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
His excuses would fail to impress us. Someone who builds tall buildings or flies an airplane must know that there is no room for such errors. If you choose to undertake tasks whose very nature means that mistakes are a matter of life and death, you need to know that there can be no excuses. That’s why the criteria for such positions are so demanding — and that is why, thankfully, such disasters are rare.
Life and Death in Ruchniyus
If we apply this model to Yiddishkeit, we find that every Torah-observant Jew understands that there are certain red lines that can’t be crossed no matter what. Sometimes the same person has other areas of Yiddishkeit where he gives himself more leeway.
R’ Yisrael Goldhaber told me that he heard this story from the chassid R’ Nachum Mendel Tzeilingold:
There was a non-Jewish police officer in the town of Stolin. If someone was caught smuggling goods to avoid taxes, it was this officer’s job to make sure he was punished. Occasionally, the policeman would visit Rav Yisrael of Stolin to ask his advice, and they developed a very friendly relationship.
One day, the policeman and his Jewish assistant, a man who had unfortunately strayed from the path of Torah, came to seek the Rebbe’s advice regarding a certain issue. In the course of the conversation, the policeman said that he wished to express his admiration for Torah-observant Jews.
“We caught two Jews who were apparently smuggling. We told them that if they swore they hadn’t smuggled, the charges would be dropped and they wouldn’t be punished. So they stood up and took an oath that they had never smuggled. They were then told to sign their names to a document attesting to their oath. The Jews insisted that they were unable to sign because it was Shabbos.
“I wanted to tell you about these two Jews who were willing to be imprisoned just so they could avoid writing on Shabbos.”
When the policeman left, his Jewish assistant remained in the room. He approached the Rebbe and whispered in his ear, “Everyone knows that those two Jews are professional smugglers. They swore falsely! Is it praiseworthy that they didn’t want to write on Shabbos?”
The Rebbe answered, “Why don’t you understand? When a Jewish child picks up something that is muktzeh on Shabbos, his mother cries out in a panic, ‘Shabbos, Shabbos!’ Those cries are engraved in the child’s heart and absorbed in his bloodstream.
When those children grow up, they will keep Shabbos under all circumstances.
At the same time, if their mother didn’t keep her promises, they learned that falsehood is an option.”
This ingrained value system isn’t necessarily logical, but it becomes a way of life. People get used to the idea that certain things can be played with, and certain things cannot. If a child grows up in a home where the very idea of telling a lie is not an option, throughout his life he will continue to view falsehood as a red line that cannot be crossed.
Foundations and Buildings
Let’s return to the question of how a tiny mistake can produce such disproportionate, catastrophic results. The answer is that Hakadosh Baruch Hu wanted us to learn that there are indeed small actions that can cause vast destruction. This natural law is intended to help us understand that in the world of ruchniyus as well, certain systems cannot be tampered with at all and must be safeguarded with great care.
The Ohr Hachaim Hakadosh teaches that even someone who ate something forbidden b’shogeg, inadvertently, is afflicted with timtum ha’lev, a blocked heart, impairing his ability to experience kedushah. Even though it was a mistake. In the physical world we all know that if someone swallows poison by accident, the results can be fatal. That is why we take strict precautions with poisonous chemicals.
So too, when it comes to machlokes, Hakadosh Baruch Hu says, “You must understand that there is a foundation and there is a building. It’s true that there are nisyonos in many areas, and much to improve and repair. But ahavas Yisrael is the foundation. Everything else is built on top of that. Just as a physical building constructed on shaky foundations will fall down, if the hearts of the Jewish people are divided, the building cannot remain standing. That is why sinas chinam caused the destructions of the Beis Hamikdash.”
The Midrash (Bamidbar 15) explains a pasuk in Amos (9:6) עַ ל וַאֲגֻדָ ּתוֹ יְ סָ דָ הּ אֶ רֶ ץ :
This is similar to a palace built on rafts that are tied together. As long as the rafts are connected, the palace stands. If they separate, the palace can no longer stand. So too, k’vayachol, Hashem’s Throne is established above when the Jewish people are connected and form one united group.
What a frightening image! The presence of the Shechinah, the Beis Hamikdash, korbanos, and Hashem’s Throne all stand on one foundation: the unified souls of Klal Yisrael. If that connection disintegrates, no matter how much we work on improving ourselves, all of the above will collapse. That is the nature of the world as created by Hashem.
Bayis Rishon and Bayis Sheini
We now have to resolve another apparent contradiction. Chazal tell us that the first Beis Hamikdash was destroyed because the Jewish people transgressed the three aveiros of avodah zarah, gilui arayos, and shefichas damim, and the second Beis Hamikdash was destroyed because of sinas chinam. This implies that the first Beis Hamikdash was destroyed despite there having been unity during that time. Why is that?
The Beis Hamikdash serves two purposes: it is a place for hashra’as haShechinah in this world, and it is a place that unifies the Jewish people. The prevalence of those three cardinal sins during the time of the first Beis Hamikdash interfered with the ability of the Beis Hamikdash to serve as a home for the Shechinah in this world. The Divine Presence cannot coexist with such evil, so it departed. And without hashra’as haShechinah, the Beis Hamikdash crumbled.
However, the nature of that Churban was such that the Beis Hamikdash was able to be rebuilt. The palace fell, but the foundation remained. Despite their great transgressions, the Jewish people during the era of the first Beis Hamikdash were united by ahavas Yisrael. They had descended to a very low spiritual level, and even when they returned from Babylonia, they were on a very low level. Nonetheless, they were able to rebuild the Beis Hamikdash because it would be able to fulfill its purpose of unifying the Jewish people. The infrastructure of ahavas Yisrael still remained. The hashra’as haShechinah never equaled that of Bayis Rishon, but it was still a functioning Beis Hamikdash.
However, when sinas chinam became prevalent, when divisiveness took hold, the Beis Hamikdash was no longer able to perform its function of unifying Klal Yisrael. The foundation deteriorated, and the building was destroyed and was never rebuilt, to this day.
The Only Way to Rebuild
This was the message of the Belzer Rav, and of the Mishnah quoted above. There may be many areas in which we have to improve. But it is impossible to build the third Beis Hamikdash without first rebuilding the foundation. Countless tzaddikim have taught that if the Beis Hamikdash was destroyed because of sinas chinam, it can only be rebuilt with ahavas chinam.
It is now easy to understand why the yetzer hara invests so much energy in his attempts to foment machlokes and division among us. The yetzer hara is a smart investor who only invests where it is worth his while. We also have to be smart and invest as much as we can in defeating sinas chinam and fostering ahavas Yisrael. We must relate to anything that may divide us as a non-negotiable red line that must not be crossed. We can’t play around with it at all, because doing so leads to destruction — Churban. And causing churban is simply not an option.
Rising to the Challenge
Here’s a person who says, “I am not up to the challenge. Someone wronged me and embezzled my money. How am I supposed to avoid hating him?”
He is right. The challenge is great and we can’t trivialize people’s experiences. Nevertheless, we must understand the extent of destruction that comes about when Jewish hearts are divided. If this person auto-
