1.
My heart was with the murdered and their families, the pain was great, but the joy of the Torah burst forth in full force and covered everything.
Pain alongside joy, but alongside joy, the sight of orphaned children, starving and in pain, opposite children dancing with a Torah scroll and a flag, sorrowful and painful faces opposite radiant and glowing faces.
And as always - the great people are the ones who are taken, and the great lessons, not only from their lives, but even from their deaths, are heard, and the heart cries out and the soul is tormented. But there is no moral torment here, because in their lives and deaths they commanded us to have faith.
They tell of Naamah, who was beautiful in an indescribable way, whose words entered the hearts of all who heard them, and all of them spoke faith. They tell of Eitam, who had the power of love for God, love for Israel, and love for life.
So many people listened to their advice and went their own way.
Stories are told about the saints Aaron Benita and Nehemiah Lavie, just as they were told in the past about the saints of Israel who were taken. The soul cries out and no one ponders or hesitates.
The joy of faith in the joy of the Torah.
2.
On Saturday, the eve of Sukkot, my brother and I were with a family member in the emergency room at Hadassah Ein Kerem.
An emergency room is not a happy, cheerful place by nature. More cries of anguish and loud wails are heard there than sounds of laughter and joy.
This Shabbat, too, screams filled the air. Shortly before we arrived, the two children who had been trapped in a car in Moshav Zanoah arrived at the scene. One of them died on arrival and the other was brought in in very serious condition.
The night has come.
Each companion sits next to the patient they are bringing, and the overwhelming fatigue causes the eyes to close.
Where do you lay your head? Like angels from heaven, a number of young men, yeshiva students, suddenly appear before our eyes, with a noble smile and an offer that is impossible to resist: 'Come and let us show you where you can lay your head for a few hours!''
We followed them to an old building, huge in size, looking like a dark demon's den inside. The men stopped on the 3rd floor, the women climbed to the 6th floor. Darkness reigned in the place. Where were we being taken? We climbed step by step. It was worth it. The floor to which we were led had large, spacious rooms, many beds stood in each such room, and from each bed emerged a figure lying in her clothes, asleep.
An empty bed was found for us too, and thus our sleepless torment came to an end.
When we got up early in the morning to return to the patient we had been caring for, we met these boys again.
""Come and see where there is a synagogue here. We will also show you where you can eat, where you can drink, where you can hear Kiddush, eat hot kegel, and where the Shabbat meal is held.".
If we weren't in a place for a need that is not at all exciting - we would simply rejoice and be happy. What is missing? Everything is available. Maybe we got the address wrong and here is an old, ancient guesthouse, made of ancient stone.
We had Shabbat dinner with dozens of people who didn't know each other, all of whom found their place under one roof, as young waiters, these are the volunteer yeshiva students, filled the plates with Arab dishes and in quantities that would put a guesthouse to shame.
When I returned to the emergency room, I heard shouting. One woman who had arrived with her sick mother shouted at the staff: "What's happening to you, so what if it's Saturday? Can't I buy a roll? And what if I want something to eat? Where do you want me to get it now? Where?""
The staff ignored the shouting. They are used to shouting in the emergency room.
I turned to her and said, "Come and I'll show you where you can get a bun, and even more than that.".
""No," she cried, "you probably want to take me to a group of religious people who are distributing food, I won't come with you to these religious people, what is this here, if they aren't religious then there's no one to talk to? Why are all the people who organize things like this religious? Why???""
At the third meal, I looked again at the young waiters, who ensured a place to sit for the newly arrived guests, who also ensured paper towels to wipe hands, who also ensured the transportation of an elderly man whose companion disappeared for a moment and who was returning in a wheelchair, who also paid homage to a great and well-known rabbi, and who also organized the singing - and I saw angels in them.
Not religious or otherwise. Simply angels.
And despite the condition of the patient I was accompanying - I felt joy in my heart, joy in the scholars who know what Torah is and know that the way of the land preceded it.
3.
Simchat Torah.
On the street between the synagogue where I prayed and the one closest to it, I discovered a commotion. Ten children surrounded a single pakkala that was on the road. We all know the Simchat Torah bags, large and bulky, usually filled with various sweets, making your life exciting.
""Maybe this bag belongs to Shlomo," said a curly-haired girl. "Shlomo, wait a minute, did you get a bag?""
""Maybe it belongs to that boy who ran there quickly?" someone else suggested, pointing to his receding back. "Maybe he ran and then the bag fell on him?""
""Maybe it fell out of the bag of Pekelach that Rabbi Meltzer was holding?" - suggested another child. "I mean it fell out before he handed out the bags - so it's his.".
The bag lay still on the road, a group of children around it, still licking the remains of the sucker from the previous bag, their eyes bulging. But no child touches a bag that is not theirs.
""Maybe it's the pauper?" asked one child.
""Why is it so random? There are signs here. This is a bag that was distributed at the synagogue of...""
They were still talking and an older boy, the brother of one of them, approached. "Hey, he called, did you find a bag? I can't believe it, Miller's son is missing a bag, he's crying really hard in the synagogue.".
He grabbed the bag and ran with it into the synagogue, straight to Miller's son, with the whole gang following him.
And I remained standing, hugging my granddaughter with one hand, who was as interested in the play as I was, and with the other hand wiping a tear from my eye. Yes, these are your children, God, perhaps thanks to them, thanks to this Jewish innocence, we will be blessed that in this year, which has just begun, our sorrow will turn into joy and our tears into a rain of blessing.
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