I was eavesdropping again. Well – not really eavesdropping. It’s easy to become distracted when you are learning alone and another person is talking on the other side of the room.
The way of Torah is not the way of a library. A library – everyone must be quiet. Let the other person concentrate on what he is reading. Shh.
That’s good for reading – but not necessarily learning. In Torah – we talk aloud, discuss, argue, participate, opine, disagree, question, ask and understand. Torah wants questions – because G-d wants you to find truth. We find truth by asking and questioning – not by accepting info spoon fed to us.
Last week’s parasha / weekly Torah reading – VaErah – spoke of the Seven first plagues. The second plague was the frogs. It all started with one big frog. It came out from the Nile river. The Egyptians hit the frog with sticks. Every time someone would hit it more frogs would be produced. More frogs came from the river and the frogs multiplied until until they invaded all Egypt.
Someone mentioned a connection between the plague of frogs and Corona.
The Parallel Between Corona & the Plague of the Frogs
The world tries to wipe out Corona. They hit it with one vaccine. Then another vaccine. Then a booster. But it still comes back. First Covid-19. Then the Delta Variant. Then the Omicron variant. It mutates into something else.
What lesson to take?
The Talmud gives several signs of the time of Mashiach / Messiah. The government will become heretics. Wine will be expensive. Chutzpa (Insolence) will increase. The face of the generation will be like the face of a dog.
As the Talmud [Sotah Chapter 9 / Mishna 15] says:
“With the advent of the footsteps of Mashiach, insolence will increase and prices will soar; the vine will yield its fruit, yet wine will be dear; the government will turn to heresy and no one will rebuke them;… and the face of the generation will be like the face of the dog…
So upon whom can we rely? — Upon our Father Who is in heaven.” [Sotah 9:15]
One explanation of the face of the generation will be like the face of the dog is – when a dog is struck by a stick – he gets angry at the stick. He will bite it. (Don’t try this at home.)
The same applies to our generation – we are being hit by Hash-m’s / G-d’s stick – COVID. What do we do? We fight the stick – with vaccines, vitamins, azythromicin (Z-pack), Green Chiretta. Fine. But have we lost sight of Who sent this virus in the first place to awaken us?
Hash-m.
Why? Because He wants His children to return the love He showers upon us daily -through us doing teshuva / repentance and following His precepts – the Torah.