"You shall strengthen yourselves and take from the fruit of the land."

Rabbi and Rebbetzin Goldberger in Israel - photo by Ezra Leventhal

Yom revi'i, 13 Sivan 5771.

I always think of my Rav and Rebbetzin when Parashat Shelach rolls around.

There are a few reasons for this; but a primary reason is that Rabbi Menachem and Rebbetzin Bracha Goldberger refuse to fit any stereotypes.  A typical stereotype, for instance, is that American Chasidic rabbis do not traditionally support aliyah to Israel.  And yet, a very large percentage of Rabbi Goldberger's congregation either lives in Israel or is in the process of making aliyah; and a disproportionate number of Congregation Tiferes Yisroel's young people has served in the IDF.  Of course, there are also a number of our young people who have attended yeshiva in Israel for a year or two; but, again, a surprising number of those return and settle in the Holy Land.  This is due in large measure to the unabashed love the Goldbergers have for Eretz Yisrael, a love they share happily with their congregants.

This blog is named for my favorite pasuk in the Chumash, which can be found in this parasha, a pasuk I believe to be a favorite of Rabbi Goldberger's as well:  "!עלה נעלה וירשנו אתה כי-יכול נוכל לה" -- "We shall surely ascend and conquer it, for we can surely do it!" (Bamidbar, 13:30)

There are many beautiful and inspirational p'sukim in the Chumash.  So what is it about Calev's rallying cry to the Jewish people, in the face of the spies who were trying to dissuade them from entering the Promised Land, that resonates for me so much more than all those other bits of Torah wisdom?

Besides the fact that it is all about aliyah to the holiest place in the world, this pasuk also reminds us not to "go along to get along."  If G-d thinks we can accomplish something with His help, who are all of those naysayers to tell us that it is not possible, that there are too many obstacles between us and success?

A Jew must remember that he works for The Front Office.  He doesn't just work for himself; and he certainly doesn't work for all those who tell him he can't succeed.  If G-d tells us (as He seems to, many times throughout the Torah) that He wants His people in His land, why should we let anyone tell us that it is not where we belong?  And why should we believe that surviving here is beyond our poor abilities?  (I mean -- it IS.  But it isn't our project.  Our job, to paraphrase a favorite military expression, is as follows:  "When G-d says jump, we say 'How high?'")

How high, indeed.

Rabbi and Rebbetzin Goldberger have helped us to become ourselves, and not some cookie-cutter version of themselves.  They have helped us to love every kind of Jew, no matter how different from us.  They have taught us such a sense of kehilla-as-family that all "TYers" feel connected, no matter how long it's been since we davened together or how far apart we live on the globe.  They have shared with us their version of Chasidut, which includes the injunction to use the tools G-d gives us to make our own decisions -- and to live by them.

They made it okay to leave their shul to come to live in Israel.  Not easy, but okay.

Thank you, Rabbi and Rebbetzin, for taking us higher.  Rebbetzin, I wish I could be there for your Coffee House Concert.  I know that it will be wonderful, and will inspire the ladies of our community to even greater closeness, and to the fun of being spiritual -- another instance of a stereotype you sidestep.  Thank you both for being our teachers, our friends, our family.


Glossary:
Pasuk, p'sukim: verse, verses
Parasha: chapter
Kehilla: community, especially the tight-knit community in a synagogue or small town
Davened: prayed
Shul: synagogue

Cherries! Like little hearts bursting wth love for this Land...

Yom chamishi, 3 Tamuz 5769.

I did not pick these cherries at the currently ongoing Gush Etzion Cherry Festival. A sensitive anesthesiologist-cum-blogger nicknamed QuietusLeo (aka "The Sandman") took the shot on a recent trip with family and friends.  I easily convinced The Sandman to share his excellent photograph of the cherries with the promise of a story...

The Dearly Beloved brought me to Israel for my first visit in 1991.  This little vacation of nine days (from July 4 until July 13 -- it was so special that I still have the dates locked in memory!) was to replace the honeymoon the US Army didn't schedule into its plans six years earlier.  By now, we had two little kids.  We could not have made this trip without the loving and competent help of my dear Mama, a"h, who kept the kids fed and entertained while we were away.

My dear husband wanted to show me the exciting tourist vistas of Israel that he had seen on his two previous visits.  He wanted to show me Masada and the Dead Sea, and the locale of The Good Fence.  His memories there in the Eighties were very powerful.  With the knowledge he possessed as a US Army officer, he argued with the old fellow in the kibbutz about the sounds he had heard the night before.  "Why were track vehicles [Army lashon for 'tanks'] moving late last night?  And where are all your young men?" the Dearly Beloved asked his host.  "Ehhhhhh...  those weren't track vehicles you heard.  And our young men are... you know... just out and about."  But my husband knows his stuff.  Only later did he learn that he was an aural witness to the beginning of the 1982 war in Lebanon.

But that was history.  I wanted the "now" of Israel.  I was already imagining living here.  (I promised I would visit the tourist places with him after our aliyah.)  I wanted the "thrill" of visiting the kupat cholim clinic with my friend, as she took her child for a checkup.  I wanted to wait in line at the bank, just to see if  I could cope with Israeli bureaucracy.  (Fortunately, US Army bureaucracy, with its "hurry up and wait" regimen, had prepared me to survive here.  Insider's tip:  bring a thermos of coffee, a good book, and a positive attitude.  You will meet nice people, and actually have time to get time to know them.  Don't expect to accomplish anything in less than two visits; and don't try to cross more than one bureaucratic hurdle per day.)

I shlepped my long-suffering husband around with me and our friend, Naomi, as we visited the makolet, the health clinic, the bank, and the shuk.

The shuk is why this story is all about cherries.

Our Israel-savvy, holy-but-worldly hostess showed us from which stalls in the shuk to buy.  She picked up vegetables at one stall, fruit at another...  With her guidance, we bought grapefruit that was so perfectly ripe, it seemed to fall open in our hands; and the sweetness made it taste closer to its cousin the orange than to its sour brothers we had encountered in the States.  But it was the cherries that made Naomi cry.  When she watched The Dearly Beloved -- no longer a lad at 43 -- turn into a small, delighted boy when he tasted those cherries...

You have to know that my friend Naomi doesn't cry easily.  She isn't one of those folks who sees a Hallmark card commercial and gets all misty-eyed.  But when she saw forty years drop from my husband's face at the remarkable sweetness and holy perfection of a cherry at its peak of red, ripe lusciousness, as if he'd never tasted anything so unbelievable, a tear came to her eye.

To this day, nearly twenty years later, Naomi gets a bit emotional when she buys cherries.

And she and her love of this Land and what G-d causes it to produce get a big chelek in our success here.  She taught us that what makes a successful aliyah isn't how well you can transplant your little chunk of America in Israeli soil.  What matters is how much you respect what Hashem gives to His Land, and His people in the Land, just as it is.

What if the meraglim had said, "Hey, Moshe!  See these really big grapes?  We can make really BIG wine..."

Glossary:
Kupat Cholim:  health care provider
Makolet:  neighborhood grocery store, a "mini-mart"
Shuk:  open-air marketplace
Chelek:  portion
Meraglim:  the Spies who came back from Canaan with an evil report about the land, planting doubts about their people's ability to wrest the land from the indigenous peoples  -- forgetting that G-d had told them to do it, and that He was on their side