Emuna and Unity

“And an angel of Hashem said to her (Hagar), “Behold, you will conceive, and give birth to a son; you shall name him Ishmael, for Hashem has heard your prayer.  And he shall be a wild-ass of a man: his hand against everyone and everyone’s hand against him…” (Genesis 16:11-12)
 
Rav Shalom Arush asked the entire Yeshiva student body recently to pray a six-hour hitbodedut for Jews of all kinds – everywhere – to be united under Hashem’s loving authority. This, said Rav Arush, will reverse the severe Heavenly decree that is currently hovering over our heads. Rav Arush specifically mentioned the Third Intifada page, created by the “Palestinian Authority” which has been banned by Facebook. This page was calling for the destruction of the State of Israel and encouraging the gathering of millions of Muslims to invade Israel’s borders on May 15, 2011. Once the page was removed from Facebook, additional pages with the same call to action have been posted. Since their creation, these Facebook pages have gathered hundreds of thousands of “Likes,” with similar pages gathering over 3,000,000 votes of support.
 
Rav Arush went on to say that it is our own “murderous” (angry, violent, speech and gossiping) speech with our wives, children, and each other that has brought about Hashem’s recent wake up calls: the brutal murders of Baba Elazar AbuChatzeira, Leiby Kletzky, and the Fogel family – as well as the other recent losses of Rav Lefkowitz, the Sphinka Rebbe, and the three Chabad girls killed in a gas explosion, in Natanya, when they were giving out Shabbat candles, as well as the recent multi-terrorist attacks in the south of Israel.
 
The hidden Tzaddikim told Rav Arush that the world has not shown enough compassion for these victims. Says Rav Brody: “The cause of the destruction of our Holy Temple was intramural hatred. It’s still here. Because we haven’t learned to love one another, we’re now losing our most special people…Have you noticed that everyone’s been hit? Tragedy has struck all camps – national religious, Chassidim, Lithuanians, Sefardim, within Israel, and outside of Israel.
 
Something takes place naturally during a disaster – people become attached to each other.  Those who never mixed but who suffered together feel, at least temporarily, an indescribable sense of brotherhood and unity between themselves. It’s the same for anyone who jumps into the life-raft with his fellows rather than sink to the depths   –  the bonding is instant – people of different religious, economic and social backgrounds – become one – when they find themselves in dire straits. Undoubtedly – common peril is one type of cement that binds people together. The reason, however, that this brotherly love doesn’t continue to hold them together is that it was not based on emuna. Where there is no emuna there is no wisdom – where there is no wisdom there are no miracles –  and only a miracle can bring the rich together with the poor; the religious with the non-religious; the political left with the political right – and keep them together. When it happens “without Hashem”, they eventually go their individual ways – back into their comfort zone of only caring about people like themselves! – Once again they have nothing to do with each other.
 
Without emuna we have only our animal instincts to depend upon – we want to shoot at whatever moves first. “Shoot him or be shot” says the animal brain – because we can’t decipher the message that Hashem is sending us though the “enemy”. The problem with this “logic” is that usually we have the exact problem that the “enemy” is manifesting. For example: a father and son are learning Torah in the same Beit Midrash (synagogue) with different study partners. The son borrows his father’s cell phone and forgets to return it. Later on, the son develops a headache and leaves without telling his father where he is going.  Without emuna, the father thinks that his son is his “enemy”. After all, his son left disrespectfully without a word and took his father’s cell phone! With emuna the father sees that his son is not his enemy but rather a loud speaker through which G-d is saying: “Hey – if you don’t like the feeling of being disrespected by your own son why do you show disrespect to your father in Heaven – to Me?…and if you want your son to be more communicative with you, why don’t you speak more often to Me? I only took your cell phone away for one day to get you to think about how often you make Me wait “by the phone” for days before I hear from you!
 
Never have we faced a greater challenge than we face now. Our leaders are exhorting us to learn emuna under fire. But will a crash course in emuna rescue us at zero hour? Is it possible to change so quickly?  Emuna tells us that we can – but not alone. We need to pray hard to come closer to the real Tzaddikim and to connect our imperfect emuna with their perfect emuna. Then we will know what to fix in ourselves – we will know how to love and care about each other and we will see the “enemies” threats crumble as so many have crumbled in the past.