HaRav Yitzchak Yosef addressed what happened at Meron on Lag B’Omer at the beginning of his weekly shiur on Motzei Shabbos, saying that we can’t understand the cheshbonos of Shamayim.
“This terrible tragedy that cut the lives short of Bnei Torah and avreichim, tzaddikim and chassidim, bnei yeshivos – it breaks every heart,” Rav Yosef said. “We don’t know the reason for this wrath, why this fury was unleashed. We’re not aware of the cheshbonos of Shamayim.”
“When we come to the Beis Din shel Maaleh after 120, there won’t be any questions – why this one went at age 12, why this one at age 30. Here in this world, we don’t know.”
“We need to be mechazeik. This shocking tragedy needs to be mechazeik Am Yisrael – in tznius, in kedusha, hasmadah in limud Torah and above everything else – ahavas chinam. It happened at the end of the time during which the talmidim of Rebbe Akiva died.”
“The Torah protects us and is a source of salvation,” Rav Yosef concluded. ‘Ki heim chayeinu v’orech yameinu.”
(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)
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8 Responses
“We don’t know the reason for this wrath, why this fury was unleashed. We’re not aware of the cheshbonos of Shamayim.”
בכבוד הרב but was Hashem “angry” when klal yisrael was in מצרים, and they had to go through all that צער?
Who am I to agree or disagree but compare the words of the Rishon Letziyon Shlit’’a to the words uttered by others, and these words are a chizuk, at least for me.
The whole Tenaach is full of episodes that clearly show that we do have to know, what are we doing wrong that caused this punishment; If not, than Hashem gained nothing with the whole punishment. It would be like a Principal of a school, running into a school yard and beating up thirty children and just leaving, without saying a word why they deserved those severe punishments.
If HE doesn’t know then let him resign!
Unfortunately, the Rav omitted mentioning the ahavas chinam in the Ponovitch Yeshiva.
rational not the thread for humor even gevaldig dark humor
Let us unite from happiness (Rosh Chodash Sivan. Rashi on Vayichan Shom Yisroel) rather than through sadness.
His father, Maran quoted in Yalkut Yosef said “one who guards his soul should stay far away from there on that day”