For the past few months we have been hearing about how Ariel Sharon is going to set the permanent borders of Israel, change the political system to a Presidential one, change Israeli politics, etc.
Given the events of last night and this morning it is clear that he will be doing none of this and he may not even live out the day.
We should learn from this that a person can make all kinds of plans, but ultimately everything depends on Hashem. You can be the most powerful person in the country 1 minute and be struck powerless the next.
In addition we should all take a lesson from this and not put things off until tomorrow (I will learn more, do more mitzvos etc.), because tomorrow may never come.
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You might want to pick up a copy of Hamishpacha this week. In it there is a 2 page article about Sharon and Kadima's desire for a secular revolution - constitution, secular conversion, selling of pig, chillul shabbos, the works...
With last nights events having just occurred, this is interesting as well.
The last time there was "secular revolution" on the agenda, the intafada started back in 2000 or something
More about Sharon and very appropriate for the Jewish Worker:
Last night (Wed), in the YU beis medrash, Rabbi Rapp gave over a vort from the former rosh yeshiva of KBY, R' Goldvicht ZT"L, who regarding a medrash on this weeks parsha. B'kitzur, The medrash says "oi lanu miyom hadin, oi lanu miyom hatochacha". If the brothers were incredibly embarrased by Yosef's simple "I am Yosef", when HKB"H says after meah v'esrim "I am Hashem", the shame will be all the more so.
R"G asks, what's the big deal with Yosef's line? It's not like he accused them of selling him and causing their father so much pain? The ba'alei hamachashava say that yosef had the haskhkafas hachaim that one must go out to the goyim in order to be an or la'goyim. The brothers were of the haskafa that we must not stick to ourselves and not enter their world. When they sold Yosef, they were in effect saying that let's see what becomes of your hashkafa.
When Yosef said "I am Yosef" years later, the brothers suddenly realzied that their haskafas hachaim was perhaps not the only path in life. It dawned on them that perhaps everything they held deat until now was nothing and incorrect and that the correct path in Hashem's eyes was that of Yosef!!
Rabbi Rapp concluded, that the greatest shock in life is when you find out that perhaps your haskafa was totally incorrect. All your effort was in vain. For example, let's take the man who established the settlements and who also brought about their end. It's not exactly clear what he's doing [perhaps with regard to the unilateral pullout], and perhaps the world will never know.
So, I thing Rabbi Rapp had this last point that one thing is for certain, that the shock felt by the people of gush katif is one whose hashkafas hachaim is overturned. Some people were absolutely positive that the settlemets would not be evicted, that the disengagement wouldn't happen. The fact that is did might have been more of pain then the fact that they had to leave the places that they had lived for years.
That last paragraph is my interpretation of R' Rapp's idea. I think it fits.
Anyway, a gut shabbos.
Very nice pshat. The Beis Halevi has a famous pshat about this as well. I will try to post it today or tommorrow.
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