Anyone who has studied Torah knows that there are two sets of admonitions known as Tochaha in the Chumash – the first given by G-d Himself in the Book of Leviticus (Sefer Vayikra) in Parshas Bechukosai, and the second given by Moshe in even more gruesome detail in the Book of Deuteronomy (Sefer Devarim) in Parshas KiSavo. Traditionally, these are identified as prophecies of the destruction of the First and Second Temples, respectively.
As related in a d’var Torah given by Rabbi Yissocher Frand, a key difference between them is that the first ends with immediate words of consolation: “And yet for all that, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not reject them, neither will I abhor them, to destroy them utterly and to break My covenant with them; for I am the L-rd their G-d. But I will for their sakes remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their G-d: I am the L-rd” (Vayikra 26:44-45).
The second, however, ends with more dire consequences of not obeying the commandments: “And the L-rd shall bring you back into Egypt in ships; by the way whereof I said to you: ‘You will see it no more’; and there you will sell yourselves to your enemies for bondmen and for bondwomen, and no man shall buy you” (Devarim 28:68). Corresponding to the greater length of exile, the scholars explain that the destruction of the First Temple was followed by an exile of finite duration (70 years), whereas the destruction of the Second Temple has resulted in an exile of indeterminate duration (nearly 2,000 years to date), whose end will be determined by our doing teshuva (repentance).
Likewise, the consolation following the second tochacha is delayed until Parshas Netzavim. It is a matter of debate whether the re-establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 represents the beginning of the Final Redemption, the ingathering of the exiles.
In recent years, however, following the doctrine that the experiences of the fathers are signposts for the sons, Torah scholars have been moved to identify the aforementioned verses as prophecies related to our own times. One such remarkable identification was given in a drasha by the then-rav of Young Israel of Phoenix, Rabbi Reuven Mann, who asserted that the second Tochaha was a premonition of the Holocaust. At the end of his analysis showing how the verses in the Tochaha match the actual horrors experienced during the Holocaust, he made the remarkable assertion that the verse from Devarim cited above was actually realized: The “ships” correspond to the trains that brought Jews to the concentration camps. Moreover, the phrase “no man will buy you” refers to the refusal of the Western world to rescue Jews, as exemplified by U.S. State Department Assistant Secretary Breckinridge Long’s invoking any possible excuse to deny entrance visas to refugees.
Now, however, comes another dramatic prophecy. In his fascinating recently published book The War Against the Bible, Rabbi Elie Mischel interprets Chapter 9 of the Book of Nechemiah to be a prophecy of the October 7, 2023 massacre. (A condensed version can be found at https://mizrachi.org/hamizrachi/prisoners-of-hope-zechariahs-prophecy-of-october-7/.) This conclusion is by no means a slam-dunk, to borrow a basketball term, as the text is rather murky. Rabbi Mischel interprets it as follows:
To begin, he quotes Rashi: “The prophecy of Zechariah is extremely enigmatic, because it contains visions resembling a dream that requires an interpretation. We cannot ascertain the truth of its interpretation until the teacher of righteousness comes” (Rashi, Zechariah 1:1).
Chapter 9 begins with an obscure reference to the land of Chadrach, which the Sages interpret as a time, not a place, the time being the era of Mashiach. Chadrach can be separated into two words – chad, meaning “sharp,” and rach, meaning “soft,” which Rashi identifies as the Mashiach, who is “sharp against the nations and soft to Israel” (Rashi, Zechariah 9:1). Rabbi Mischel continues, “When the Mashiach arrives, he will inaugurate an era that will be very ‘sharp’ and painful for Israel’s enemies, but ‘soft’ and joyous for Israel. This is the era of turmoil and redemption that will unfold in the generations preceding the Mashiach’s arrival – the era we are living through today.”
Rabbi Mischel then identifies specific passages in Zechariah with today’s war. He notes that the reference to Tyre, an ancient city in Lebanon south of Beirut, corresponds to the location where Hezbollah is currently fortified, and he interprets the verses “she [Tyre] gathered silver like dust and gold, like the mire of the streets. Behold, G-d shall impoverish her, and He shall smite her wealth in the sea, and she shall be consumed by fire” (Zechariah 9:3-4), as referring to the funding of Hezbollah by Iran and the terror organization’s destruction by Israel.
Next, Rabbi Mischel finds in verses 5-6, which read “Ashkelon shall see and fear, and Gaza – and she shall quake violently… And a king was lost from Gaza… and I will cut off the pride of the Philistines,” the promise that G-d will punish the present-day Palestinians, the spiritual heirs of the ancient Philistines, whose name they have adopted.
Going further, he writes that his heart stopped upon reading verse 11 – “With the blood of your covenant I have freed your prisoners from a pit in which there was no water” – because Hamas held over a hundred hostages in pit-like tunnels.
Nevertheless, G-d has promised we will prevail over our enemies. How can this be?
Rabbi Mischel writes in the 5785 Sukkot-Simchat Torah issue of HaMizrachi magazine: “We are not a normal nation. Other nations facing enemies like ours would have disappeared long ago. But we are the nation of renewal, a people who rise up from every defeat stronger than we were before. We are a people constitutionally unable to throw in the towel. From our birth as a nation amidst the hell of Egypt, we were destined to forever be ‘prisoners of hope’ – for we always find a path to salvation.” (The phrase “prisoners of hope” refers back to Zechariah 9:12, “Return to the stronghold, you prisoners of hope.”)
By contrast, Chabad.org in its translation of Tanach with Rashi follows the traditional line, going only as far as to identify verse 9:13, “For I bend Judah for Me like a bow; I filled [the hand of] Ephraim, and I will arouse your children, O Zion, upon your children, O Javan…” with the historical events that the Greeks conquered the Persians and Judah Maccabee led a Jewish revolt against the Greeks. There is a passing reference to the Edomites, the descendants of Eisav, who are generally held to be the spiritual antecedents of the Romans, but no mention of the modern-day Edomites, the European and North American secularists who are their spiritual, if not biological, descendants.
Regardless of which vision is true – the traditional or Rabbi Mischel’s (and it may be that both of them are, much as the teachings of Hillel and Shammai) – we can be sustained by the promise of ultimate redemption. Rabbi Mischel relies on the prophetic point of view, while from the secular point of view, David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister, held that to be a realist in Israel one must believe in miracles.
P.S. The material from the second half of Rabbi Mischel’s book, constituting a deeper view of the modern expression of Zechariah’s prophecy, coupled with an admonition derived from Zephaniah that Israel should not depend on America, provides the basis for a future column.
