פסח – Happy Passover
8th Aviv 5780 – April 2, 2020
Chief Rabbi Capers Shmuel Funnye
Shalom, Kol Adath B’nai Yisrael, first acknowledging the source of all that exists, The G-D of Abraham, the G-D of Isaac and the G-D of Jacob, the Redeemer of the Children of Yisrael, in this holy season of Passover. I am certain that most of us have never witnessed what we are seeing today, a faceless enemy called the Corona virus. During the time of Moses, Pharaoh and his army was the enemy. The Children of Israel were able to see their enemy. They felt the lash of taskmasters on their backs. The Israelites suffered for over two hundred and twelve years, when a Pharaoh arose that did not know Joseph. Now the world faces an unseen enemy, COVID-19.
We are in the midst of a worldwide pandemic, and people are afraid of becoming infected by the COVID-19 virus. So now we are “Sheltering in Place,” working from home, public schools are closed throughout the country, restaurants, malls, and factories are closed; brokers on Wall Street and Television Journalist are working from home. More people have been laid-off than at any time in recent memory, and the Stock Market is in a flux every day. Even professional sport teams, throughout the world have cancelled their schedules for the foreseeable future; the Olympic Summer Games have been moved to 2021. These are truly unprecedented times that we are facing.
Is G-D trying to tell us something? Is this the season of our redemption? Is the House of Israel ready to be redeemed? Is G-D pushing Israelites together like never before? Is this the time to heed the words of the prophet Zephaniah 2:1-3; “Gather yourselves together, yea, gather together, O nation not desired; Before the decree bring forth, before the day pass as the chaff, before the fierce anger of the Lord come upon you, before the day of the Lord’s anger come upon you. Seek ye the Lord, all ye meek of the earth, which have wrought his judgment; seek righteousness, seek meekness: it may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lord’s anger.” Or, the words of the prophet Habakkuk 2:1-4; “I will stand upon my watch, and set me upon the tower, and will watch to see what he will say unto me, and what I shall answer when I am reproved. And the Lord answered me and said, Write the vision, and make it plain upon tablets, that he runs that readeth it. For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry. Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him: but the just shall live by his faith.”
So, I ask during this season of Passover פסח when we are commanded to empty ourselves and our homes of all leavened products, may we also circumcise the foreskins of our hearts, and follow the words of the prophets Zephaniah and Habakkuk, that we gather ourselves together and learn to live by our faith. Then the words of the prophet Micah 4:1-2; “But in the last days it shall come to pass, (I am not saying that these are the last days, but when the last days do come) that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established in the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; and people shall flow unto it. And many nations shall come and say, come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the G-D of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for the law shall go forth of Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” Let us establish the house of the Lord in our time and the time of our children, that it may be established in the top of the mountains. So, May His will be done! הג פסח