Hoshana Rava, Tenth of Tevet, Tu B'Shvat, Mozai Tu B'Shvat. Monday, January 25th, Tuesday, January 26th.<\/p>\r\n
Do you know what all these dates have in common?<\/p>\r\n
Well, they were all given as a forecast, a deadline, and a possible time.<\/p>\r\n
The Hebrew dates were promised as the most precise time for the coming of our righteous Messiah, and the foreign ones predicted the terrible storm that would paralyze the entire State of Israel.<\/p>\r\n
The simulated snowstorm, of course.<\/p>\r\n
Both prophecies, needless to say, did not come true. One of them should be said: "Unfortunately." Guess who could have been dispensed with.<\/p>\r\n
This new and bizarre, not to mention crazy, trend of 'lucky dates' given out every morning in the names of outstanding Torah scholars and leaders of righteous communities has begun to gain momentum and real fire on the ultra-Orthodox street. And not only.<\/p>\r\n
\u2022<\/p>\r\n
In my case, it was a work, and a week before the fast of the 10th of Tevet, I randomly met a Jewish scholar, whose face shone like the brightness of the sky, and whose eyes shone like two polished diamonds. He was standing in the synagogue plaza after evening prayers, and almost swore, picking up an object, that it was a fifth vessel, from the mouth of one person to the Torah minister Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky, who promised, exactly that, that by the 10th of Tevet of this year, the Messiah would come.<\/p>\r\n
He did not bless, he did not wish, he did not hope, he did not hint. He explicitly promised that the Messiah would come, in his glory, in person, and on his donkey.<\/p>\r\n
And I, a believer in the faith, left the synagogue trembling, drove home in my car, went to the wardrobe and felt with both hands my personal Shabbat suit, the one in which I will welcome the Messiah in exactly one week. I checked and felt twice, if I'm not mistaken.<\/p>\r\n
\u00a0He didn't come, the Messiah. He didn't even call.<\/p>\r\n
I, for a change and miraculously, was not surprised.<\/p>\r\n
Three months earlier, my innocence had already been shattered.<\/p>\r\n
A dear friend, and a generally trustworthy man, swore to me by promise (because it is forbidden to swear on the truth, you know), that some unknown rabbi also swore (by promise, by promise) that at the end of Hosanna Rava, not a minute later, the Messiah would come with a great shout. Oh, what a Hosanna Rava I had, you would never know.<\/p>\r\n
In fact, so that you may know and be purified. A small Yom Kippur, just like that.<\/p>\r\n
But what kind of Hosanna in the highest was I? Oh, and Zamir.<\/p>\r\n
This terrible feeling of disappointment has the power to disrupt legal proceedings. Believe me, from experience. It is a difficult feeling, and one that cannot be contained.<\/p>\r\n
What do you mean it didn't come? But they promised justice. Go explain to yourself on the eve of Simchat Torah, about the cooling power of a second and third vessel, let alone a fifth.<\/p>\r\n
This is why, as mentioned, I wasn't surprised at the end of Lent either. I was just angry, very angry. Not at that wonderful, straightforward Maggid, who heard his friend who heard his friend's friend, who dreamed of Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky. Not at him, he's not guilty of anything. Not at myself either, I'm allowed to believe in a respectable man who wears a tie even on a weekday.<\/p>\r\n
I was angry about the trend, about our simple acceptance of prophetic spirits being thrown around the streets. Have you ever thought about why it's so popular? How can it be that for more than two thousand years, the prophecies have been repeating themselves and not even squeaking?<\/p>\r\n
The answer to this is simple, very simple.<\/p>\r\n
\u2022<\/p>\r\n
If you were in Israel last week, the weather forecast was probably your top concern. Close acquaintances told me that the phone line of Rabbi Uri Betz, Yitzchak Ya'akov, was dead for hours and it was almost impossible to reach him.<\/p>\r\n
The inconceivable load on the forecasters' network in Israel almost broke the record set on the 10th of Tevet 5774. Celebrations were postponed, residents were displaced from their homes, children were upset, and parents scratched their heads in miserable anticipation of the snow that mocked and never came.<\/p>\r\n
Like Sisera in his time, tens of thousands of Jerusalemites stood and pressed their noses to the window pane with alternating hope and heartbreak.<\/p>\r\n
The snow didn't come, he didn't even call.<\/p>\r\n
Still, they believe and hope, and Rabbi Uri's phone line will not be overloaded even in February 2017, nor with the next promise of a contract in another settlement.<\/p>\r\n
Desire, expectation, longing, and hope are so powerful that they can even believe in someone who disappointed you last time.<\/p>\r\n
The snow may differ from our righteous Messiah, and the sight may differ from the sight, but only the true faith that is generations old, and only our immortal desire to behold the face of our righteous Messiah, are what make us run to the wardrobe, at every rumor of one kind or another, and make us check again and again whether our Shabbat attire is still in its glory.<\/p>\r\n
\u2022 Menachem Mann is an ultra-Orthodox journalist and publicist:\u00a0Yoredea.man@gmail.com<\/i><\/i><\/p>\r\n
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