[הנה אנכי שלח לכם את אליה הנביא לפני בוא יום יהוה הגדול והנורא]
(23) Lo, I will send the prophet Elijah to you before the coming of the awesome, fearful day of the LORD. (24) He shall reconcile parents with children and children with their parents, so that, when I come, I do not strike the whole land with utter destruction. Lo, I will send the prophet Elijah to you before the coming of the awesome, fearful day of the LORD.
אֶלָּא לָשׂוּם שָׁלוֹם בָּעוֹלָם. שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר (מלאכי ג, כד) "וְהֵשִׁיב לֵב אָבוֹת עַל בָּנִים". וְיֵשׁ מִן הַחֲכָמִים שֶׁאוֹמְרִים שֶׁקֹּדֶם בִּיאַת הַמָּשִׁיחַ יָבוֹא אֵלִיָּהוּ. וְכָל אֵלּוּ הַדְּבָרִים וְכַיּוֹצֵא בָּהֶן לֹא יֵדַע אָדָם אֵיךְ יִהְיוּ עַד שֶׁיִּהְיוּ.
...rather he will come to bring peace to the world. "He will return the hearts of the fathers to their children (Malachi 3:24)" And there are those among the sages who say that before the Messiah will come, Elijah will come. And all of these things and things like them, people won't really know how it will be until it happens.
(4) The Presence of the LORD entered the Temple by the gate that faced eastward.
The Golden Gate, one of the Old City's eight gates and known in Hebrew as the Shaar HaRachamim (the gate of mercy), is in a direct line from the peak of the Mt. of Olives on the other side of the Qidron valley to the east of the Old City, from there to the Holy of Holies on the Temple Mount.
The Ottoman Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent sealed off the Golden Gate in 1541. While this may have been purely for defensive reasons, in Jewish tradition, this is the gate through which the Messiah will enter Jerusalem and it is suggested that Suleiman the Magnificent sealed off the Golden Gate to prevent the Messiah's entrance.
The Muslims also built a cemetery in front of the gate, in the belief that the precursor to the Messiah, Elijah, would not be able to pass through the Golden Gate and thus the Messiah would not come. (http://www.crystalinks.com/jerusalemgates.html)
We can understand the above texts in two different ways:
1) Was it a mistake for the Jews to have put their trust in Elijah to usher in the days of the Messiah? His path was to be repeatedly blocked by centuries of invaders and occupiers of the holy city.
2) If ruling empires felt the Jews' Messiah (and it agent Elijah) was a threat, building a wall or a cemetery was not going to keep us living by God and Torah.
Either way, we have a group carrying or relying on a rather false sense of security/confidence...
Are modern-day security measures considered viable in making the world safer from existing threats?
- Airport security scanners
- Bomb drills where children would hide under their desks
- Metal detectors at the doors of our community institutions
- Armed guards in our schools
Recent Facebook post:
If your child hits another child with a stick, do you:
A. Give everybody sticks.
B. Give sticks to kids who are adept with sticks to defend everyone else.
C. Take away the stick.
(יג) וַיֹּ֥אמֶר מָרְדֳּכַ֖י לְהָשִׁ֣יב אֶל־אֶסְתֵּ֑ר אַל־תְּדַמִּ֣י בְנַפְשֵׁ֔ךְ לְהִמָּלֵ֥ט בֵּית־הַמֶּ֖לֶךְ מִכָּל־הַיְּהוּדִֽים׃ (יד) כִּ֣י אִם־הַחֲרֵ֣שׁ תַּחֲרִישִׁי֮ בָּעֵ֣ת הַזֹּאת֒ רֶ֣וַח וְהַצָּלָ֞ה יַעֲמ֤וֹד לַיְּהוּדִים֙ מִמָּק֣וֹם אַחֵ֔ר...
(13) Mordecai had this message delivered to Esther: “Do not imagine that you, of all the Jews, will escape with your life by being in the king’s palace. (14) On the contrary, if you keep silent in this crisis, relief and deliverance will come to the Jews from another quarter...”
In the Pesach narrative, the redemption came from on high, but this cannot be counted on. Mordechai, one of the heroes of our last holiday, did not believe that we could sit by and not act. This Pesach, seeing ourselves as if we too came out of Egypt, means accepting that we ourselves are charged with proactively bringing about a better and safer world. It is our responsibility to remove the physical threats in our communities that enable the most killing of innocent lives in our schools and in other gathering places.