Dvar Torah for Bein HaMitzarim

Excerpts from Likutey Halakhot, Hilkhot Berakhot Pratiyot 5

One of the axioms of being a Jew is to guard very, very carefully the realization that there is a coming world, wherein one lives his ultimate destiny. To protect this realization, one has to work at not being mean-eyed, i.e., neither jealous or stingy.

The way to do this is by crying. The entire KiNoT (elegiac liturgy of Tisha b'Av and the Bein HaMitzarim are intended to bring about TiKuN (rectification) which comes through repentance. This is in fact summed up by the close of the Book of Eikhah (Lamentations), "God - bring us back to You and we will repent" (5:21). The main purpose of our crying is to arouse God's pity on us, so that He will help us to genuinely repent.

In other words, we want our tears to conquer our meanness and to wash away our forgetfulness, so that we may always keep our focus on how our living now will impact on our ultimate destiny.

God, too, wants us to maintain our focus. To that end He never stops sending reminders. These reminders manifest in one of the following realms: person, space or time. The ultimate expression of this was in the Beit HaMikdash (Holy Temple) and it is lamented by the prophet Yirmiyahu (Jeremiah), "He has uprooted His booth [the Beit HaMikdash] like a garden; He has destroyed His meeting place [the Holy of Holies]. God has caused holiday and Shabbat to be forgotten in Tzion. In the fury of His anger he spurned king and kohen [priest]" (Lamentations 2:6).

"He has uprooted His booth" - with the destruction of the Beit HaMikdash the concept of holiness has been uprooted from space. [The notion that a particular place has such inherent holiness that it is impossible to sin there is almost unheard of; or that a particular place is so godforsaken that it matters not what is done there for it cannot be sanctified, is all too common.]

"God has caused holiday and Shabbat to be forgotten in Tzion" - the holier a piece of time is, the clearer the signals that God flashes us. As is known, Yom Kippur is an aspect of the World to Come. This is why the signals on that day are so particularly powerful.

"In the fury of His anger he spurned king and kohen [priest]" - refers to inherent holiness of the person himself. Each one of us has within the holiness of the kohen gadol (high priest) and genuine tzaddikim (the "king" - see Gittin 62a). [If one would remember that she is royal, she would be more aware that many types of behavior are beneath her dignity.]

These are the three Eikhahs (laments). "Eikhah [oh how] she sits alone, the city that teemed with people..." (Lamentations 1:1). [We cry in order to regain our sensitivity to the holiness, potential and/or inherent, of each place we come to.]

"Eikhah, in His anger, did God becloud the daughter of Tzion...in the day of His anger" (ibid. 2:1). The daily and timely hints that God sends are cloudy and unclear - we have trouble relating to and drawing from special days and special events.

"Eikhah the gold has become dimmed...the holy stones have been thrown into the streets" (ibid. 4:1). The precious golden soul of mankind has become dim, so cheapened as to be denied. "The holy stones," holy Jewish souls [see Likutey MoHaran II, #67], "have been thrown into the streets," are exposed to gutter influences.

Despite it all, if we would avail ourselves to the genuine tzaddikim, whose sole desire is help us focus on living with God in all that we do, there would be hope. But if we think "the gold has become dimmed," if their words fail to draw us or we consider them irrelevant, then their absence is twice as bad as the Temple's destruction (Eikhah Rabbah 1:39).

"Godãbring us back to You and we will repent; renew our days as of old!"

Agutn Shalom!
Shabbat Shalom!