Maybe the War Is Over, But the Battle Still Continues: Vayera 5786
Should we take down the Israeli flags with yellow ribbons wrapped around the Star of David — and go back to the simple blue and white of our nation’s emblem?
It’s a strange question, isn’t it?
Is the war over?
It’s October 8th. The headlines say shalom. The speeches have been made. The tanks have rolled back.
And yet… should we really fold away the flags that have waved from balconies and car windows for over 2 years? Should we untie the yellow ribbons from our wrists? Should we tuck away the dog tags symbolizing the hostages?
Maybe the war is over.
But the battles — the battles of the heart — still rage on.
The living hostages have come home. Some are still missing. Our young soldiers have returned changed forever — some walking with bodies intact but souls scarred. Parents still wake in the night when a door creaks. A generation of children knows too much.
So perhaps we take off the ribbons — but we leave the flags.
We stand in the tension between grief and gratitude, exhaustion and endurance.
The Song of Survival
And then — a night like this one. The war is officially over. The news says peace.
But in a stadium in Israel, under bright lights and a bruised sky, singer Maor Buzaglo walks onto the field.
He takes the microphone — no barrier, no distance — and begins to sing לצאת מדיכאון (Getting Out of Depression), a song by Yigal Oshri and Ofir Cohen.
On either side of him, soccer players stand shoulder to shoulder, each holding a small child in front of them. The stands are filled with people — young and old, some in army uniforms, some in team jerseys, some smiling, some crying.
And Buzaglo begins:
“?אתם יודעים מה הדרך הכי טובה לצאת מדיכאון”
Do you know what the best way out of depression is?
He answers gently:
Family. Friends. Maybe going out for fun. Deep conversations — conversations of the soul at night.
In the stands, thousands listen.
It isn’t an anthem of victory — it’s a confession of survival. A reminder that healing doesn’t come from headlines or speeches, but from human connection.
“הנשמה במלחמה עם הקארמה…”
The soul is at war with karma.
And isn’t that the truest thing we’ve learned?
That even when the war outside ends, the war within continues — the soul wrestling with guilt, loss, memory, and meaning.
The Torah’s Echo
That struggle brings us to this week’s parashah, Vayera, and to one of the most haunting stories in the Torah — the Akedah, the Binding of Isaac.
“קַח נָא אֶת בִּנְךָ… אֲשֶׁר אָהַבְתָּ”
Take your son, your only one, the one you love… (Genesis 22:2)
Abraham hears God’s voice and rises early. He and Isaac walk together — וַיֵּלְכוּ שְׁנֵיהֶם יַחְדָּו — father and son, side by side, into unspeakable tension.
The miracle, of course, is that Isaac lives. The ram appears. The knife stops midair.
A “near miss.”
But after that — silence. Abraham and Isaac never speak again. Isaac walks down the mountain, but does he walk away whole?
Ramban suggests that the trauma of that moment — the sheer nearness of death — never leaves him. Later, Isaac becomes quiet, withdrawn, a man of wells and shadows. As Rabbi Jonathan Sacks once wrote, “He is the first survivor.”
And then, immediately after the Akedah, the Torah tells us:
“וַיְהִי אַחֲרֵי הַדְּבָרִים הָאֵלֶּה וַתָּמָת שָׂרָה…”
And after these things, Sarah died. (Genesis 23:1–2)
The Midrash says Sarah died when she heard what Abraham had gone to do — that he had taken their son to be sacrificed. Some say her soul fled from her in shock. Others whisper that she could not bear the thought of living without him.
I’m not suggesting Sarah died by her own hand.
But I am suggesting this: she died of grief too heavy to hold.
The Hidden Toll
We know that grief.
How many lives have been broken not only by the war itself, but by its aftermath — by the weight of memory, the silence, the ache of surviving?
The Akedah tells of Abraham and Isaac on the mountain — but the true devastation unfolds offstage:
A family shattered.
A mother gone.
A father and son who never speak again.
Only now, as the dust of this war begins to settle, are we beginning to understand what has been lost.
Not just the names and numbers — but the unseen toll.
The marriages strained. The children afraid.
The laughter that returns only in fragments.
And still — amid that silence — we hear it:
“גם בשעות החשוכות של הלילה / תמיד יהיה כוכב קטן שיאיר לך את הדרך הביתה…”
Even in the darkest hours of the night, there will always be a little star to light your way home.
It’s always darkest before sunrise.
That’s what faith is — holding on through the night, trusting that dawn will come.
Faith as Vulnerability
“כל מכשול זה מדליה / קם ונופל אבל בדרך שלך…”
Every obstacle is a medal. You rise and fall — but on your own way.
Those words could have been written about Abraham, about Isaac, about every soldier, every parent, every survivor.
“להתמודד עם הפחדים / לקפוץ למים עמוקים…”
To face your fears, to jump into deep water.
Maybe that’s what faith looks like now — not blind obedience, but brave vulnerability.
To swim to the end, to reach the shore, to find your way home — עד הלילה.
And then, a line that feels almost like Torah itself:
“להאזין גם לשירים / כי זמרים הם הרופאים הכי טובים שיש למדע להציע.”
Listen to songs too — because singers are the best doctors science has to offer.
Maybe that’s why Maor Buzaglo’s song matters. Because in that stadium, he became our physician. His prescription was simple: family, friendship, courage, and song.
Holding On to Hope
How many October 7ths would we have endured without our heroes — those who answered the call, who understood that army service is not only obligation, but sacred duty — the moral imperative of sustaining a nation?
We are here because they were there.
And so maybe — maybe we leave the flags up a little longer.
We let them fade in the sun, not as symbols of war, but as reminders of resilience.
We take down what signals despair, but we keep what signals hope.
Because even as we walk down from our own Mount Moriah, still trembling from what might have been lost — we keep singing.
“עוד יבואו ימים טובים, אני מבטיח…”
Good days will come, I promise.
Days of love.
Days of faith.
Days of light.
May those words be more than lyrics.
May they be our covenant — renewed each time we choose to live, to rebuild, to believe.
And may we, like Isaac, step off the mountain scarred but alive — and walk together toward healing.
Shabbat Shalom.