Spiritualitc TORAH POR ION Considering Aliyah? Experience our new Aliyah Planning Workshop The Sound Of Tears Shabbat Vayishlach: Genesis 32:4- 36:43; Obadiah 1:1-24. Short /4 Long Term Aliyah Planning Monday, December 15th • 8 - 10pm Jewkll Community Center of Metropolitan Detroit A "A cry is heard ...Wailing, bitter weeping Rachel weeping for her children. She refuses to be comforted For her children, who are gone." Bove are the words of seemingly eternal suffering of our Jeremiah, proclaimed by nation: "Thus says the Lord,'Refrain that great prophet of Israel your voice from weeping, and your as he witnessed the exile of the Jewish eyes from tears; for your work shall people from our land over 2,500 years be rewarded ...There is hope for the ago. He envisioned Rachel, Jacob's future ... the children will return to beloved wife, the mother of Israel, their borders:" weeping for her lost children. How chilling a fulfillment of this This is not the first time prophecy, watching the in the Bible that Rachel bodies of the victims of the cries. In our parshah this Mumbai massacre return week, we hear Rachel cry for burial to the borders of out in pain as she dies dur- our Holy Land. ing the birth of Benjamin. The Zohar teaches that We may imagine also when the Messiah comes, the tears that Jacob shed he will be crowned at the when he buried his first grave of Rachel. He will love, Rachel, by the road to bring to her the news of the Bethlehem. Centuries later, Redemption and she will, at Rabbi Eric it is the grave of Rachel that long last, be comforted. The Grossman Jews would visit to pour out massacre in Mumbai makes Special to the their hearts to God. salvation feel more distant Jewish News What is it about the image than ever, but the image of of Rachel's tears that has caskets draped in Israeli stirred the souls of generation after flags, flown to the Jewish state aboard generation? Is it the anguish that only an Israeli Defense Forces aircraft offers a mother can feel at the pain of her a small banner of hope to our battle- son, a life she has nurtured with her wary people. own body? Or perhaps it is the torment At long last, we have a homeland to of a parent who knows that she can- which to return. Still, we await an end not put an end to the suffering of her to Rachel's tears, and to our own. own baby? I saw it once put simply: A mother crying for her child, it just does Rabbi Eric Grossman is the head of school not get worse than that. at the Frankel Jewish Academy in West The Jewish people heard the sound Bloomfield. of Rachel again last week in the cries of 2-year-old Moshe, son of Gavriel and Rivka Holtzberg, the Chabad emissar- Conversations ies who were gunned down mercilessly When Rachel gives birth, she in Mumbai. The sight of the orphaned names her child "Ben-Oni" Moshe calling out for his mother in the meaning "son of my suffer- midst of her memorial service captured ing." Why would Rachel want the despair of the Jewish people at the such a name for her son? Jacob senseless massacre of our people that changes the child's name to has continued virtually without respite "Benjamin" meaning "son of since our inception. my old age." What is the sig- As if to echo the words of Jeremiah, nificance of this change? The an Israeli newspaper reported that the parshah also contains the name child had to be removed crying from change of "Jacob" to "Israel," the service because"... he refused to be meaning "One who Struggles consoled."A child crying for his mother, with God." How does this name it just does not get worse than that. reflect the destiny of the Jewish Jeremiah foresaw an end to the people? 15110 W. Ten Mile Rd, Oak Park MnIti-media informotiongl !Ansion • Employment 8, Retirement in 1,,rael Commi FriXeS, S1:11001S (111d MOI [(xi' obout our new 'Go North' project, offering enhonced ossistarice pockwies foi Olin moving k) Northern bud Foo more ittforniation owl to register www.nbn.org.il/workshops Persona' Aliyah Meetings (h y ,,p r .intm.,n,,,,,i y ) Tuesday, December 16th www.nbil.org ..11/ 121 • 1-866-4 -MAYAN NefA B'Nefesh 5y- WP Til3DI0n We Jewish Agency for Israel Aliyah: Live the dream www.nbn.org.il • 1-866-4-ALIYAH 1 /1,1i www.nbn.or9.it 1