יום שישי י"ט באדר ב תשפ"ד 29/03/2024
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  • The Mission Continues

    As in the past so it remains today - we were and still are under the selfsame commitment to adhere to the directions of the Gedolei Yisrael, who stand guard against breaches of purity threatening our camp. When we were required to ask – we asked. When we were instructed to depart – we left. The moment we are summoned back to raise the flag, every other consideration is pushed to the side and we answer: We are ready!

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בראי היום

  • Harav Yisrael Friedman zy”a, the Rebbe of Husyatin

    מוטי, ויקיפדיה העברית

    The ancestral chain of Harav Yisrael Friedman, the founder of the Husyatin chassidic court, originates with the holy Baal Shem Tov. The Husyatin chassidus has its roots in Galicia and eventually came to Tel Aviv, during the turbulent years between the two World Wars.

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  • Maccabi'im Gravesite

    In honour of Chanukah, we will discuss a fascinating, ongoing investigation attempting to establish the place of burial of Mattisyahu Kohen Gadol and his family.

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Reflections

Babylonian Exile

From the time of the Babylonian Exile and the destruction of the first Temple, the Shechinah left its place of dwelling in the Beis haMikdash and went into a period of obscurity. Despite the many calamities that continued to befall the Jewish people in all their exiles, they never ceased to turn their eyes towards their Father in Heaven, in hope and in prayer.

Motty Meringer 28/07/2009 14:43
“By the rivers of Bavel (Babylon), there we sat and we wept as we remembered Tzion; by the willow trees upon which we hung our lyres; for there, our captors asked us for words of song, and our tormentors told us to be happy – ‘sing us the songs of Tzion’; how shall we sing the song of HaShem in a strange land?; if I forget you, Yerushalayim, may my right hand forget its skill – may my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth – if I do not remember you – if I do not raise up Yerushalayim to be the greatest of my joys.”

After the murder of Sancheriv, the King of Ashur, by his servants, as he lay prostrated in front of his idols, the fortunes of the kingdom of Ashur started to wane, and the power of Bavel rose against it. The first association between the kingdom of Bavel and the kingdom of Yehudah was in the fourteenth year of the rule of King Chizkiyahu, King of Yehudah. The King of Bavel, Merodach Baladan (son of Baladan), sent Chizkiyahu a gift when the latter became ill and was confined to his bed. Chizkiyahu received the gift and then took the bearers of the letter from the King of Bavel on a tour of his kingdom, showing them all his treasures and the treasures of the Beis haMikdash. He even showed them the Ark of the Covenant and the Two Tablets placed within it, as well as all the other utensils of the Beis haMikdash. After the King had finished showing the messengers all the wonders of Yerushalayim, Yeshaya the Prophet arrived and asked King Chizkiyahu who the two men were and what they were doing in Yerushalayim. Chizkiyahu replied that they were messengers from the King of Bavel who had sent him a gift together with enquiries after his health. Yeshaya then asked the King what the messengers had seen in the course of their visit. Chizkiyahu replied that he had shown all his possessions to the messengers, as well as all the sights of Yerushalayim. Yeshaya then told the King; “Listen to the words of HaShem – behold, days are coming when I will lift up all that is in your house and all that was acquired by your forefathers – and I will give it over to Bavel – not one thing will I spare – so says the L-rd.”

Chazal tell us that when Merodach Baladan sent his gift to Chizkiyahu, he also wrote a greeting to the King of Yehudah and to HaShem and to Yerushalayim. Just before the messengers set out on their way, Merodach realised that it was not proper for him to have preceded his greeting to HaShem with his greeting to the mortal King. Immediately, Merodach got up from his throne and took three steps towards the messengers in order to bring them back. The messengers returned, and Merodach wrote a new letter in which he first greeted HaShem, and then Chizkiyahu and then Yerushalayim. HaKadosh Baruch Hu said to Merodach; you got off your throne and took three steps for My honour – in this merit three kings will issue from you who will rule over the entire world. These three kings were Nevuchadnetzar, Evil Merodach and Belshatzar.

Several kings ruled the kingdom of Yehudah after the reign of Chizkiyahu, and the prophecy of Yeshaya was only fulfilled in the days of King Yehoyakim. King Yehoyakim ruled over Yehudah for eleven years. In the fourth year of his reign, King Nevuchadnetzar came to do battle against Yerushalayim. King Yehoyakim humbled himself before Nevuchadnetzar and paid him taxes for three years. After these three years, Yehoyakim rebelled against the kingdom of Bavel and ceased to serve Nevuchadnetzar. For four years, until the death of Yehoyakim, the kingdom of Yehudah suffered repeated incursions and invasions by foreign armies such as Aram, Moav and the Kasdim. But throughout this time, the kingdom of Yehudah retained its independence.

After the death of Yehoyakim the King of Yehudah, his son Yehoyachin became King, who was also known as Yechonyah. His reign was brief – it lasted just three months. At the end of this period, Nevuchadnetzar the King of Bavel conquered Yerushalayim, plundered its wealth and exiled the King along with his family. Also exiled to Bavel were ten thousand men from the most prominent families of the Jews; those who had served as the heads of the Sanhedrin, talmidei chachomim and many teachers of the Jewish people. Only the poor of the common people now remained in Yerushalayim, without rabbonim or any other leaders to guide them. On the other hand, with the fullness of time it became evident that this prior exile of the ‘prominent’ people was a case of ‘providing a cure before the disease’. When the Beis haMikdash was eventually destroyed and the Jews who had remained in the kingdom of Yehudah were also exiled and came to join their brethren who had preceded them, they found that the yeshivos had already been reestablished in Bavel and that they could resume their Torah life in that strange land. According to some opinions, the seventy years of this galus are reckoned from the time when Yechonyah was exiled with the ‘prominent’ Jews.

In place of Yehoyachin, Nevuchadnetzar appointed Mataniya, the brother of his father Yehoyakim, as King in Yerushalayim. Nevuchadnetzar then changed Mataniya’s name to Tzidkiyahu, saying; “HaKadosh Baruch Hu will pronounce judgement (yatzdik) upon you if you rebel against me.” Tzidkiyahu ruled in Yerushalayim for eleven years; in the ninth year of his reign he rebelled against Nevuchadnetzar. His rebellion was not a military one; instead, it was the breaking of a promise he had made to Nevuchadnetzar.

At the beginning of Nevuchadnetzar’s reign, Tzidkiyahu had seen the King of Bavel sitting and eating a live rabbit. Although the nations of the world are not forbidden to eat rabbits along with other non-kosher foods, they are bound by the prohibition of eating ‘a limb from a live animal’, which is one of the seven mitzvos given to the bnei Noach, the descendants of Noah. In addition, the act of eating a live animal was looked upon with contempt and disgust by the nations of the world at that time. Therefore, when Nevuchadnetzar realised that Tzidkiyahu had witnessed this action, he made him swear that he would not reveal what he had seen to any person.

In the ninth year of his reign, Tzidkiyahu broke the promise he had made, and revealed the embarrassing episode to five kings who were vying for the throne of Bavel. The name of Nevuchadnetzar became reviled and his reputation and standing in the eyes of his servants deteriorated greatly. Nevuchadnetzar considered this to be tantamount to a rebellion against him and he proceeded to ascend in battle against Yerushalayim.

On the tenth of Teves the army of Bavel arrived outside the walls of Yerushalayim and besieged the city. On the ninth of Tammuz, three years later, the walls were finally breached and the city fell to the Kasdim. Tzidkiyahu fled the city via a tunnel that led from Yerushalayim to the plains of Yericho, but he was captured there by soldiers who had been chasing a deer and spotted the King emerging from the end of the tunnel. He was brought to Nevuchadnetzar who slaughtered his son before him, then put out Tzidkiyahu’s eyes and exiled him to Bavel.

On the seventh of Av the Babylonian general Nevuzaradan arrived in Yerushalayim and began to slaughter the masses of the Jews still living there, until their blood flowed as far as the Beis haMikdash and mingled with the blood of Zecharia haNavi who had been murdered there. When Nevuzaradan saw the blood of the prophet, which was bubbling and frothing, he asked the Kohanim what it was. They answered him that it was the blood of the sacrifices, but Nevuzaradan did not believe this explanation, and took sheep and oxen and slaughtered them next to the blood of Zecharia, in order to test the truth of their words. When he saw that the bloods were not alike, he threatened the Kohanim that he would have their flesh combed with iron combs if they did not reveal the true source of the blood. The Kohanim then told Nevuzaradan that the blood was that of Zecharia haNavi who had warned the people in the name of HaShem to repent from their sins – therefore, he had been murdered. Around a hundred years had since passed, and the blood of Zecharia still had not been appeased.

When Nevuzaradan heard this, he told the Kohanim that he would appease Zecharia, and he immediately ordered the great and the small Sanhedrins to be brought before him and he slaughtered them on the blood of the prophet. But the blood continued to froth and seethe, and so Nevuzaradan had youths and maidens brought before him, from the finest families, and they too he slaughtered – yet the blood continued to boil. Then Nevuzaradan brought tiny infants and slaughtered them too – and still Zecharia’s blood continued to froth. Seeing this, Nevuzaradan cried out; “Zecharia, Zecharia – I have killed the finest of the people – be appeased lest I am forced to kill them all.” Immediately after these words were spoken the blood of the prophet ceased to seethe.

At the sight of this wonder, that so much spilled blood did not atone for the blood of Zecharia, Nevuzaradan began to contemplate his deeds, considering that if the slaughter of one soul had demanded so much bloodshed in compensation, what would become of him, who had killed so many? Once he came to the conclusion that he had sinned, he immediately composed a final testament to his family and fled to a great distance where he converted, becoming a Jew. The Talmud Bavli in maseches Gittin relates that Nevuzaradan indeed became a ger tzeddek.

After two full days of slaughter in Yerushalayim, on the ninth of Av close to evening, the first Beis haMikdash went up in flames and it continued to burn until the evening of the tenth of Av. In the Talmud Bavli, maseches Taanis, it states; “When the first Beis haMikdash was destroyed, it was the evening of the ninth of Av, on a Motzoei Shabbos, in the year of Motzoei Shvi’is, during the mishmar of Yehoiariv. The Levi’im were singing and standing at their posts. What song were they singing? “And He has brought upon them their own iniquity; and will cut them off in their own evil.” They did not even manage to complete the verse with the words ‘HaShem Elokeinu will cut them off’ before the gentiles arrived and conquered them.”

Those Jews who survived the great slaughter in Yerushalayim were exiled to Bavel. Only very few were permitted to remain in Eretz Yisrael, under the leadership of Gedalyahu ben Achikam. The exiles passed the kever of Rochel Imeinu on their way to Bavel, where they prayed for the Redemption and entreated their great ancestor to intercede on their behalf. Further along the way the exiles passed cities belonging to the descendants of Ishmael, and they begged food and water from the inhabitants. The Ishmaelites brought them salty fish to eat, and when they had eaten, and had become terribly thirsty from the salt, they requested that they be brought water to drink. Then the Ishmaelites brought them water pouches which were in fact inflated only with air – when the Jews tried to drink from them, they perished.

The Jews who were then exiled to Bavel took with them stones from the Beis haMikdash and with those very stones they built a house of prayer in the city of Nehardea in Bavel. The name of this synagogue was ‘Shaf v’Yetiv’, which translates as ‘uprooted and established’, in remembrance of their having been forcibly removed from Yerushalayim and brought to this place.

The Jews living in Bavel suffered greatly from the gentiles there, who would taunt them, reminding them of the beauty that had been Yerushalayim and the destruction that had been wrought upon it. The Babylonians would demand that the Levi’im play for them the tunes of the Beis haMikdash – in response, the Levi’im bit off their thumbs so that they would be unable to play their instruments, as it says; “How can we sing the songs of HaShem in this strange land.”

Thirty-seven years after the expulsion of Yechonyah, which was almost twenty years after the destruction of the Beis haMikdash, Evil Merodach the King of Bavel took Yechonyah out of the pit where he had been holding him and crowned him as the ‘Resh Galusa’, the head of the exiles. After Yechonyah died, his son Shaltiel was appointed to replace him, and after him, his son Pediah. After the petirah of Pediah, Zeruvavel was appointed leader of the exiles, and it was he accompanied the Jews on their return to Eretz Yisrael.

The Babylonian exile lasted seventy years. Chazal relate that these seventy years were a punishment for seventy years of shemittah that had not been observed by the Jews in Eretz Yisrael prior to their exile, as the Torah states; “I will scatter you among the nations, and I will draw out the sword after you; and your land shall be a desolation, and your cities shall be laid waste. Then shall the land be repaid her sabbaths, as long as it lies desolate, and you are in your enemies’ land; even then shall the land rest, and repay her sabbaths.”

The Babylonian exile and the destruction of the first Beis haMikdash were lamented by the prophet Yirmiyahu in Megillas Eichah, which he composed. It is read on the night of Tisha b’Av. At the conclusion of the Megillah, the Navi requests; “Why do You forget us forever, and forsake us for so long? Turn us to You, HaShem, and we will return to You – renew our days as of old.”