Shalom Friends;
Our Purim vort is being sponsored by Avraham and Miriam Deutsch of Efrat dedicated for the Chayalim – may they maintain their health and spirit. To Mishpochat Deutsch, many thanks for your sponsorship, and your continued kindnesses.
You can celebrate a Simcha — a birth, a Bar/Bat Mitzvah, a Chassuna or other Simcha event in your life, or commemorate a Yahrtzeit of a loved one, or for whatever other reason by sponsoring a Parshat HaShevua.
Please forward to your relatives and friends and encourage them to sponsor a Parshat HaShevua. And please be in contact with me with any questions, or for further details.
Best Regards,
Moshe Burt
olehchadash@yahoo.com
skype: mark.burt3
**********************************************
This author was zocha to be able to be among those who were present during the Shiva to give comfort to the avul — Jonathan Pollard. Many thanks to Shimshon Alpert for offering me a ride to the Shiva house.
Below is a link to an Israel National News report on the Pollard Shiva house with an extremely poignant video where Jonathan describes his final moments with Esther.
Please click on the link to the video above and view Jonathan’s words as he spoke them. It’ll make a difference in your lives.
But Jonathan spoke more after this brief account captured on video.
He spoke of his wife Esther as his Morah — his teacher.
Among his accounts of Esther were a number of encounters that she
had with Israeli generals where she asked them what they would need
to win the big war (as I would understand as the final war — Gog and Magog).
The generals, as I heard it, responded by saying more planes, tanks, rockets, etc.
Esther responded with mussar. They were wrong. What is needed is Emunah and Bitachon. “And if you don’t have them, you are NOT a Jewish general.”
Once Esther and Jonathan arrived in Israel, they went up north to the border with Syria. Esther said to Jonathan: “Look at our land (pointing to Syria). Look at our land. Where do you want to live?”
Esther would often respond to Jonathan’s questions by telling him. “Look at your hands.” She was indicating that the Avos, the Tzaddikim in Shemayim were sitting in judgement. This author could not quite comprehend the connection with looking at his hands.
Jonathan recalled that while imprisoned, Esther’s call to “Look at your hands” saved him from a few very sticky situations with food and with his prison room.
In closing, I was zocha to say a few words to Jonathan before the “HaMokom Y’nachem…” I said, May Esther Yocheved bat Yechiel Avraham have an Aliyah in Shemayim and, May Esther’s memory and spirit continue to lift you to at least 120 years.
In subsequent videos, Jonathan recounted several other stories of how Esther was outspoken, both in the United States and here in Israel, expressing the connections between a Jew and his brethren, a Jew and Eretz Yisrael and a Jew and the children — succeeding generations.
This author draws a direct connection between Esther’s message, both to Jonathan and to us all, and Mordechai’s message to Esther HaMalcha resulting in Esther’s fast, Esther’s presenting herself before King Achashveirosh with invitation to Achashveirosh and the evil Haman to two banquets, the exposing of Haman’s plot against the Jews resulting in Haman’s hanging on the gallows which he (Haman) had intended to hang Mordechai.
For Jews, we cannot put our trust, faith in man, our sovereignty and survival in the hands of nations, not even in Trump, Pence, the Kushners, Friedman, etc., and surely NOT in the Bidens, Harris’, Blinkens, etc. but ONLY in Hashem. Haven’t we seen this lesson played out countless times in Israel’s nearly 74 years of modern times? Need we re-recite all of the instances? Are our collective memories and attention spans sooo short?
As such, we must do as a proud, sovereign, principled Jewish nation must do for our collective security and well-being, and as a paradigm for all of the Ways of Hashem, while believing and trusting that Hashem Sees and Acts for His nation. Isn’t that the lesson of the Six Day War, of Entebbe, the taking out of that Iraqi nuclear reactor and more? .Isn’t that the lesson learned both from Chanukah and Purim?
And so, insights are given from amongst the “127 Insights into Megillat Esther” (compiled from the words of Chazal by Rabbi Mendel Weinbach of Jerusalem) and from the sefer, “Let My People Live”, by Yosef Deutsch regarding the saving of the Jews and their re-acceptance of Torah.
Mordechai gets word of Haman’s plot to eradicate the Jews. Esther is already positioned as Queen for nine years, after King Achashveirosh of Persia, in a drunken stupor, accepted and carried out the advice of the most crude and nobility-lacking of his counselors, Memuchan — later known as Haman — who called for queen Vashti’s execution. Mordechai summons Esther to entreat the king, in his court, regarding the threat to the Jews.
It’s not the first time that Mordechai summoned Esther to use the power of her throne in defense of her people.
There was the assassination plot of two of the king’s servants, Bigsan and Seresh, both of whom hailed from Tarshish (“Let My People Live”, by Yosef Deutsch, page 142 citing R’ Shmuel di Uzidah, sefer Melo HaOmer). The two spoke openly about their plot in their native tongue Tarsi (The Artscroll Tanach Series: The Megillah, The Book of Esther, Chapter 2, notes to posuk 22, page 63 citing gemura Megillat 13b), a seemingly obscure, insignificant foreign tongue. Seated about 20 paces away from where Bigsan and Seresh hatched their plot and unbeknownst to them, Mordechai overheard their assassination plot. Mordechai, a former member of the Sanhedrin (the Jewish High Court) had to be fluent in all 70 of the world’s languages, which included Tarsi, to sit in as a member of that body. The story goes that Mordechai got word to Esther who informed the King, giving full credit for disclosure of the plot to Mordechai (despite Mordechai’s wish that his name not be mentioned), taking no credit for herself. (“Let My People Live”, by Yosef Deutsch, page 147)
But, in the case of Haman’s plot and decree against the Jews, Esther is nervous. A bit of background here: according to laws enacted during the reign of Dar’yovesh (Darius) in the aftermath of Balshazzar’s assassination, and updated, with additional provisions and strictly enforced by Haman, she can’t just enter the king’s court without first having been summoned. Such a violation would be seen as “a major breach in security” (“Let My People Live”, by Yosef Deutsch, page 222 citing Aggadas Esther; Menos HaLevi; Akeidah). In fact, Deutsch indicates (page 222 of “Let My People Live”) that Haman would screen all visitors to the king lest anyone reveal that he (Haman) “once sold himself to Mordechai” or lest anyone speak up for the Jews or advocate for rebuilding the Beit HaMikdash. Deutsch indicates that Esther queried:
“Do you think that he will let me set up an appointment? He hates me! Whenever he sees me, he remembers that if it hadn’t been for me, he might have had his daughter sitting on the throne.” (“Let My People Live”, by Yosef Deutsch, page 222 citing Targum; Rokeach; Targum Rishon; Menos HaLevi)
Esther fears being put to death, not out of fear for her own life, but out of fear of being put to death, and thus being unable to act to save her people.
Megillat Esther (Perek 4, posukim 5 – 16) tell of the dialogue of messages transmitted between Mordechai and Esther and of Esther’s hesitation to approach King Achashveirosh, unsummoned (a crime of protocol punishable by death) on behalf of her people.
In the climactic 13th and 14th posukim, Mordechai responds to Esther’s message:
“Do not imagine that you will be able to escape in the King’s palace any more than the rest of the Jews. For if you persist in keeping silent at a time like this, relief and deliverance will come to the Jews from another place… And who knows whether it was just for such a time as this that you attained the royal position.”
Esther’s nervousness and hesitation regarding Haman’s decree against the Jews seemed to this author to be puzzling in light of her apparent ease of access in informing Achashveirosh of the assassination plot (the “poison plot”)? Wouldn’t the Queen, as royalty, be exempted from laws denying access to the King?
The key seems to be that the “poison plot” occurred early in Esther’s reign as Queen, just prior to Haman’s rise to power as Viceroy and his resultant strict enforcement of laws regarding access to the King. Either the Queen may have previously been exempted from laws regarding access to the King, or the enforcement of the law initiated under Dar’yovesh may have been lax or non-existent or the King and his new Queen regularly spent evenings together providing Esther with the timely access necessary to expose the plot.
But it would seem that after the “poison plot”, with Haman’s almost immediate rise to power, things changed radically in the palace, including in access to the monarch. And on top of that, it seemed that Esther’s access to the King became more and more infrequent in the time-frame of Haman’s plot to destroy the Jews. The Artscroll Tanach Series: The Megillah, The Book of Esther explains (notes to Perek 4, posuk 11, page 78) that, in expressing her concerns and hesitation, Esther tells Mordechai:
“It’s already been thirty days, that I was not summoned by the King….”
Despite Esther’s hesitation in entreating the King, in his court, regarding the threat to the Jews, the dye resulting from Esther’s humbly informing the King, in Mordechai’s name, of the “poison plot” had been cast. Rabbi Weinbach (“127 Insights into Megillat Esther”, page 88) writes:
Mordechai’s decision to report his discovery to Esther rather than directly to the king can… be understood as a means of laying the groundwork for Esther’s redemptive action.
Just as Esther HaMalcha saved the Jews of the Persian Empire, so too, Esther Pollard, in her messages, in life and to her very last words, as spoken to Jonathan and to us all, seek to bring Unity, Emunah and Bitachon in Hashem to us all.
May we, the B’nei Yisrael be zocha that our brethren — the refugee families from Gush Katif be permanently settled and be made totally whole — be totally restituted for all that was stolen from them, that the thrice expelled families of Amona be restored to their rebuilt homes and the oft-destroyed Yeshiva buildings in Homesh be rebuilt, all at total government expense; all due to alt-leftist-agendized, supreme court legalized Yassamnik gunpoint. Baruch Hashem that our dear brother Jonathan Pollard is now free of his parole and restrictions and that he is now in his second year at home in Eretz Yisrael. May Esther Yocheved bat Yechiel Avraham have an aliyah in Shemayim and may her memory continue to lift Jonathan to at least 120 years. May the MIAs be liberated alive and returned to us in ways befitting Al Kiddush Hashem — as with the return in April, 2019, via Russia, of the remains of Zachariah Baumel, as should the remains of the two chayalim from the Gaza War of five and a half years ago. May we have the courage and strength to stand up and physically prevent the possibility of Chas V’Challila any future eviction of Jews from their homes and prevent Chas V’Challila the handing of Jewish land over to anyone, let alone to enemies sworn to Israel’s and Judaism’s destruction and eradication. And may we soon and finally see the total end to the Communist Chinese corona virus pandemic and all like viruses. May we fulfill Hashem’s blueprint of B’nei Yisrael as a Unique people — an Am Segula, not to be reckoned with as with “the nations” and may we be zocha to see the Moshiach, the Ge’ula Shlaima, as Dov Shurin sings; “Ki Karov Yom Hashem Al’Kol HaGoyim”, the Ultimate Redemption, bimhayrah b’yamainu — speedily, in our time”, — Achshav, Chik Chuk, Miyad, Etmol!!!
Purim Same’ach!!
———————————————————
Moshe Burt, an Oleh, is a commentator on news and events in Israel and Founder and Director of The Sefer Torah Recycling Network. He lives in Ramat Beit Shemesh.
*********************************************************