Chizuk and Idud

CHIZUK and IDUD for Olim & not-yet-Olim respectively

Six particular verses in Netzavim (D’varim 30:1-6) are called by Rabbi Naftali Tzvi Yehuda of Volozhin (the Netziv) Parshat HaGeula, the Portion of the Redemption, because it is the most concise and unerring prediction of the different phases of the final redemption - much of which has already actually unfolded in the recent past.
“And it shall come to pass when all these things will have come upon you, the blessings and the curse”... Our generation in particular has witnessed the persistent curse of anti-Semitism culminating in the Holocaust, as well as the blessings of Jewish creative survival and the flowering of Jewish scholarship.
“And you shall ponder this among all the nations where HaShem your God has driven you” (30:1). The significance of these abiding curses and blessing for the meaning of Jewish existence and identity has indeed triggered a great deal of discussion and soul searching among Jews always and everywhere with mixed results.
“And you shall return unto HaShem your God and hearken to His voice…” (30:2) - It did not seem to us that this was what was happening. But after all, “The secret things belong unto HaShem our God…” (29:28) and perhaps He sees things differently.
“Then HaShem your God will turn your captivity V’SHAV and have compassion upon you.” An early phase of the redemption will be an easing of conditions for Jews in some of the lands of the dispersion. Jews will ultimately gain civil rights in countries that are democracies and today in the U.S. are received as equals in every way.
“And (He) will return (V’SHAV) and gather you from all the peoples where HasShem your God has scattered you (30:3). Even if any of you that are dispersed, be in the uttermost parts of heaven, from there will HaShem your God gather you and from there will He fetch you” (30:4).
I take this to mean that no matter how far away, geographically, spiritually or generationally, a Jew may have wandered, he will ultimately experience stirrings of Jewish identity and Jewish nationalism, so that in spite of all the distance and alienation, a sense of basic Jewish unity can take root.
“And HaShem your God will bring you into the land which your fathers possessed and you shall possess it and He will do you good and multiply you above your fathers” (30:5). Indeed here we are after 62 year of sovereign statehood with close to 6 million Jews with undivided Jerusalem as our capital in a better position perhaps than at any other period in our history.
Finally “HaShem your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your seed to love HaShem your God with all your heart and all your soul that you may live” (30:6). Says the Netziv, this cannot mean ‘live and not die’ (for this has been stated earlier) but rather that only here in Eretz Yisrael will you experience the spiritual delight of love of God and self fulfillment, something, says the Netziv that is not possible outside the land. We anxiously await this phase.

• Other Chizuk and Idud
• CHIZUK-and-IDUD-for-Olim-not-yet-Olim-respectively
• CHIZUK-and-IDUD-for-Olim-not-yet-Olim-respectively
• CHIZUK-and-IDUD-for-Olim-not-yet-Olim-respectively