Feature Tidbit
for Parashat Bamidbar

Where Am I; Where Are We?

First, about last week's 27-point, Bangle Bold typo. Embarrassing. The headline should have said, "It Sounds Too Simple, Yet..." Actually, there was a way to read it as it was, IF - referring to the IF of IM B'CHUKOTAI TEILEICHU... One way or the other, hope you got the message.

The questions in this week's headline are meant to be asked by each of us as individual Jews AND again as members of Klal Yisrael. Look at the calendar. Friday is Yom Yerushalayim. Shabbat is Parshat Bamidbar. Sort of opposites, no?

Yom Yerushalayim represents for us a wonderful step in the right direction towards the Geula. Israel's stunning victory in the Six Days War in the face of such overwhelming odds, is a realization of G-d's promise from last week's sedra of 5 being able to repel 100 and 100 overcoming 10,000. We're coming back to Eretz Yisrael, Yerushalayim is reunited. Jerusalem has become the premier Torah center of the world.

Baruch HaShem. So what are we doing BAMIDAR? Parshat HaShavua reminds us that after Bnei Yisrael left Egypt, they remained in the Wilderness far longer than was originally planned. Seven weeks after the Exodus we received the Torah. We remained at Sinai almost a year. And then, instead of going straight into E.Y., we ended up wandering in the Midbar for 40 years.

And now it is more than 3000 years later. Each of us looks at the calendar and we should ask ourselves, Where am I? Am I in Yom Yerushalayim, or am I BAMIDBAR? Am I a long distance Zionist or have I taken myself out of the Midbar into Eretz Yisrael? Or, perhaps, am I making the proper plans for the rest of my life, or am I content to remain in the Midbar?

And the question has to be plural too. How are we doing as Klal Yisrael? Where are we vis-a-vis Torah and Eretz Yisrael?

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