An Old Story, a Message for Today: Awaiting the Geulah
An Old Story, a Message for Today: Awaiting the Geulah
The day after Yom Kippur, Jerusalem was already bustling with preparations for Sukkot. People were hurrying through the streets, making their last-minute purchases and preparing for the chag.
Rabbi Chaim Yosef had found an etrog that he thought was particularly beautiful and Mehudar. He was very pleased with it, but before buying it, he decided to seek one final opinion.
He brought the etrog to the renowned Jerusalem talmid chacham and tzaddik, Rabbi Zalman Baharan of Meah Shearim.
After several attempts, he finally found the rabbi free to see him.
Rabbi Baharan took the etrog in his hands and slowly turned it from side to side. He examined it carefully, looking at every part of it. Then he stopped.
He held it closer and examined one particular spot. He turned the etrog slightly and looked again. Then he returned to the same place and examined it once more.
Rabbi Chaim Yosef waited quietly.
After several moments, Rabbi Baharan looked up.
“The etrog is beautiful and exceptionally fine,” he said. “But there is a small amount missing from the flesh of the fruit. It is kosher according to the rabbinic requirement for the other days of Sukkot, but it does not meet the Torah requirement for the first day.”
Rabbi Chaim Yosef thought about it.
That year, as this year, the first day of Sukkot fell on Shabbos. Since the arba minim are not taken on Shabbos, he reasoned that this etrog would be perfectly adequate for the rest of the chag.
He explained his reasoning to Rabbi Baharan.
For a moment, the rabbi said nothing.
Then tears filled his eyes.
Rabbi Chaim Yosef was startled. He had thought perhaps the rabbi was disappointed that he was prepared to settle for an etrog that did not meet the Torah requirement for the first day. But Rabbi Baharan began to cry.
“Three days until Sukkot!” he exclaimed through his tears. “Surely by then Mashiach will have come and the Beit HaMikdash will have been rebuilt!”
Rabbi Chaim Yosef listened in astonishment.
“In the Beit HaMikdash,” the rabbi continued, “the arba minim are taken even on Shabbos. All of Klal Yisrael will take the arba minim, and you will not have a kosher etrog. How can you buy this etrog?”
Then he added the words that Rabbi Chaim Yosef would never forget:
“The Beit HaMikdash could be rebuilt before Sukkot!”
In that moment, Rabbi Chaim Yosef understood the reason for his teacher’s tears.
Rabbi Baharan was not speaking about some distant future. He was looking ahead just three days and living with the possibility that the Beit HaMikdash could be rebuilt before Sukkot.
For Rabbi Baharan, the coming of Mashiach was not merely something that would happen one day. He lived with the expectation that it could happen now. The possibility of the geulah was so real to him that it affected even the simple question of which etrog to purchase.
Rabbi Chaim Yosef decided not to buy the etrog.
There is a great lesson in this story about what it means to await the geulah.
We daven every day for the coming of Mashiach and the rebuilding of the Beit HaMikdash. We ask Hashem to restore the Avodah and to bring us back to the complete service of Him. We say these tefillos day after day. Precisely because we say them so often, however, it is possible to become accustomed to the words without fully feeling what they mean.
To await the geulah means more than believing that it will eventually come. It means living with the emunah that it can come at any moment.
We say in the Ani Maamin: “Even though he may tarry, I will wait every day for him to come.”
Rabbi Zalman Baharan lived those words.
He did not know when Mashiach would come. But with only three days remaining until Sukkot, he could not accept the thought of buying an etrog that would not be suitable if the Beit HaMikdash were rebuilt. His emunah was not merely something he expressed in his tefillos. It shaped the way he looked at the days ahead and the decisions he made.
This year, as we prepare for Sukkot, the first day of the chag will again be Shabbos. The story of Rabbi Zalman Baharan therefore has a special message for us.
We should ask ourselves: When we daven for the geulah, do we think of it as something that will come one day, or do we live with the emunah that it can come at any moment?
The geulah can sometimes seem very far away. Rabbi Baharan teaches us to look at it differently. We do not know when Mashiach will come, but we must live with the emunah that he can come today.
That is what it means to await the geulah: to daven for it, to believe in it, and to live each day knowing that the Beit HaMikdash could be rebuilt at any moment.
