Yaakov Avinu spoke soft words of prayer that in essence were his swords and bows. Yes, he fortified himself with weapons of war but he remembered at all times that those weapons were only as powerful as G-d allowed them to be, and he therefore kept calling upon G-d to lead him in battle.
Whatever our father Jacob said was meant not only for his sons who were standing before him but for the sons of the Jewish people for all time. It behooves us to search our hearts and ask whether we have taken possession of those powerful unconquerable weapons our father Jacob bequeathed to us.
Everything in Jewish history is replay. “Ma’asei avos siman l’banim – whatever happened to our forefathers is a sign for the children.”
Fast forward to the 21st century. Once again we are in the position of Jacob, surrounded by enemies and in constant danger of attack. We must defend ourselves and our land. We must take the sword and bow of Jacob into our hands and cry out in prayer – prayer so powerful it will make the angles tremble and reach the very Throne of G-d.
Those of you who regularly read my columns and/or attend my classes and programs know how often I express my awe at our Hebrew language. Time and again I have noted that by digging deeply into G-d’s holy words we can discover treasures of untold wisdom.
As I pointed out in last week’s column, the word “why” in earthly languages leaves you frustrated. There are no easy answers to it. But in Hebrew the word why madua (“why”) means mah-deah – what wisdom do we learn from this?
There is yet a second term in the holy tongue for “why” – l’mah, to what end is this happening, for what purpose? In other words, we are challenged to search our souls and examine our hearts and probe our minds so that we might come to the truth.
With that in mind, what can we learn for the Har Nof tragedy? Surely we should stop and consider how it was that this unspeakable evil played out in a peaceful community where men of Torah were enveloped in prayer?
What danger did these pious people represent to their killers? Could it be that the answer is to be found in prayer – the prayer of Jacob that rendered his weapons invincible? (This same message was imparted to us by Moshe Rabbeinu: when Israel when forth in battle he would raise his arms toward the Heavens and thereby signal that our victory could come from only one source – Hashem.)
Let us search for further clarification from our Torah. Before Ishmael was born, an angel told his mother the name of the child she was carrying would be Ishmael, which means “G-d will listen.” And so it was that Ishmael discovered the powerful strength of prayer.
The descendants of Ishmael pray five times a day while we Jews, the heirs of prayer, have forgotten our mission. By our indifference we have allowed Ishmael to take possession of our most potent weapon. True, observant Jews pray three times a day, but the vast majority of our people do not pray at all; they have completely abandoned the holy language of prayer.
Ishmael is very much aware of this power of Jewish prayer and so the Muslims try to prevent us from praying in the proximity of the Temple Mount. Fanatics took that to the next step and brought the battle the holy sanctuary of a synagogue where they barbarically slew our rabbis – holy men who epitomized prayer.