By Rabbi Aaron I. Reichel, Esq.
Sometimes a page of the daf yomi (Talmudic page of the day) is amazingly relevant to today’s news, especially during this current situation, when so many of us are experiencing the most horrific news of our lifetimes. Not since the Holocaust have so many Jews, Hy’d, been murdered on a single day.
We have just started the first of the three Baba tractates of the Talmud: Baba Kama, Baba Metziah, and Baba Batra, and also the beginning of the whole Seder of Nezikin (the Talmudic tractate dealing with damages). Baba Kama literally means the first gate, when the doors of the study hall swing open and the analysis begins on how to cope with damages.
In our case, the damages and murders began on October 7, when the “impregnable” walls along the border of Gaza were breached by Hamas, something that was unimaginable, given the faith so many people had in the Israeli military and their ability to implement the will of Hashem by developing the most sophisticated security system in the world designed specifically to prevent surprise attacks. Indeed, this fatal breach affected not just the isolated communities along the border; it affected an entire region of communities and even the entire country.
The Alshich HaKadosh (1508-1593) likened the four categories of damages to the four major galuyot (exiles), where attempts were made to annihilate the Jewish people, which seemed more than concerning, just as in our current situation, except for a significant difference in our time. The four categories of damages are: shor (ox), bor (pit), ma’aveh (despoiler or plunderer), and ha’hever (fire).
Nebuchadnezzar, the warrior king, has been likened to an ox whose sole intent was to cause damage and mayhem, not merely satisfy personal desires, akin to Hamas. A bor is likened to the Persians in the days of Ahasuerus and Queen Esther, when the Jews were initially lured into the trap of participating in events inconsistent with traditional Jewish values, as is often the case in our times. Ma’aveh has been likened to the Greeks. Spoliation or plundering has been described in various ways, but one is uncovering what is hidden, akin to the Greeks, who sought to undermine Jewish spirituality, which of course cannot be seen. Hamas was and remains out for the Jews, officially because of their religion, but actually because of their hatred, which has been instilled since early childhood, and has only grown worse since they took full political control of Gaza in 2005.
Ominously, the Greeks broke through 13 pirtzos (breaches) in the soreg (perimeter) of the Beit HaMikdash (Temple), certainly conjuring up images of what occurred on October 7. Finally, fire calls to mind the Romans, who ruthlessly killed so many by fire, most notably, Rabbi Chaninah Ben Teradion, which recalls what happened to far too many Jews on October 7, rachmana litzlan. Rabbi Chaninah’s wife was decapitated, also an allusion to October 7, and his daughter was violated, still more shades of October 7. Not to mention the Romans taking many Jews as slaves, famously depicted on some of their coins and in the Arch of Titus. Many of these Jewish slaves would have been hostages (in the spirit of Hamas), had there been a community left to redeem them. Now, we have a country with the means to negotiate for their release and to fight for them, and to fight for the many more Jews who were not captured or killed.
The rulers of these countries tried to destroy the Jewish people one way or the other, and they all created havoc. But eventually they have all been swept into the dustbins of history; their civilizations became marginalized and largely irrelevant (although some of their successors geographically have created new cultures which in some cases continue to create havoc, to put it mildly), while the Jewish people have maintained their original religion and culture, notwithstanding the modifications that some have made culturally, religiously, and politically.
It is our challenge now to overcome the breaches and damages caused by the despoilers, plunderers, and blood libelers of our time, especially now that the Jewish people are united more than ever. The Western Wall of the Beit HaMikdash became the “Wailing Wall,” and is now the Western Wall once again. And we hope, in time, with the coming of Moshiach, it will become one of the four walls. The wall around Gaza will hopefully never be breached again. Ideally, there will never be a need for such a wall again. And above all, may we sing with great fervor and poignancy the sentence in the Hallel prayer that we chant on Simchat Torah and every other major Jewish holiday, “Zeh haShaar l’Hashem, tzadikim yavo-u bo. This is the gate of Hashem (the Temple Gate, as per Rashi), the righteous (certainly not Hamas) will pass through it.
This article was inspired by a shiur with uncanny relevance to contemporary events even though it was recorded by Rabbi Shalom Rosner in a previous cycle of the Daf Yomi 7-15 years ago, but without the references to Hamas and October 7.
