CIRCLES OF CALM & CHAOS
SUKKOT 5785
BY ROCHEL LEAH WEIMAN
Dedicated in memory of my brother, Gedalia Zissel ben Yoel z’l
May it be Hashem's will that he brings home safely all the
hostages, soldiers, all those displaced and protects all of Klal Yisrael.
The siren in shul Simchas TORAH rang out
...At the EXACT moment when we were saying
these words during Hallel:
כָּל־גּוֹיִ֥ם סְבָב֑וּנִי בְּשֵׁ֥ם יְ֜הֹוָ֗ה כִּ֣י אֲמִילַֽם:
All nations surrounded me;
in the name of Hashem / Havaya
that I shall cut them off.
.At the EXACT moment when we were saying
these words during Hallel:
כָּל־גּוֹיִ֥ם סְבָב֑וּנִי בְּשֵׁ֥ם יְ֜הֹוָ֗ה כִּ֣י אֲמִילַֽם:
All nations surrounded me;
in the name of Hashem / Havaya
that I shall cut them off.
And you know what EVERYONE
In our holy kehilla / congregation @AQM in Tzfat did
when we heard the siren?
We sang LOUDER!
When people ask me
“How intense is it REALLY in Tzfat?”
I've been searching for the right words to describe
our life in Tzfat, in a warzone
with truth and clarity,
as well as my decision to return here
and the choice to remain here….
BLOG: CHAGIM IN ISRAEL 5785
I've been searching my brain and heart for the words to share with you...
on these immediate days following... the Yomim Noraim through Simchat Torah
As I obsessively peruse all the news messages flashing constantly on my screen
Images and Word of Paradox...
of Tzar Gadol / Heartache & Simcha
of Struggle & Kedusha
of humility / Hod & Nitzachon / victory
of Tikkun & Tohu
of Rachel & Leah Consciousness
But then I realized ...
Its not necessary to reinvent
what has already been written so perfectly
by Dovid HaMelech...
in Tehillim 118:10
The siren in shul Simchas TORAH rang out
precisely when we were saying Hallel during these words:
כל גוים סבבוני בשם הי כי אמילם
Yes it is VERY intense here in the
Holy Ancient City of Ruach / Air
But...
הי צבאות אשרי אדם בוטח בך
...we ALSO feel Hashem extremely close - with every breath -
we have bitachon / trust in Him
amidst the sirens קולות
& smoke עמוד אש
surrounding our mountain
Because the pnimius / inner light IS here...
we feel Hashem very close HERE
the inner nekuda / point
surrounded by chaos of many forms
Ive been painstakingly and honestly
Going to my core and asking myself
Is this normal? What is normal in these days?
Do I also "thrive in chaos"? as some friends
have explained their reason and ability to live and thrive here.
26 Tishrei / Mon Oct 28
I am writing this
sitting on this bench
On Yerushalaim Street in Tzfat
As if on cue…
A chayal, soldier, sat down on the bench next to mine
I bravely asked his permission
to take his picture
It was actually the first time I had the presence of mind
to actually ask
See photo: “Sitting in the CALM, contemplating CHAOS”
I pause to feel my breath
And feel the vapor / hevel of my breath
Hevel peh of the new year תש״פה
Entering my heart, bloodstream and bones.
I feel completely aligned here… Mind, Body, and Soul
following sukkah lights
סובב כל עלמין surrounding me
ממלא כל עלמין filling me
imagining the dot in the middle of the circle
Am I there yet?
Rebbetzin Tamar Taback so eloquently wrote about this in her article Sukkos Circles:
(Simchat) "Torah is like the
ultimate umbilical chord
leading out of the
circle of the natural world.
By grabbing onto the kav / line of pnimius Torah,
up and over
into the realm of above the sun,
we encounter another circle.
(The Higher Feminine)
It is a taste of the world to come,
a circle consciousness
that is dripping slowly but surely into our beings as
we approach the end of the 6000 years
culminating with the arrival of Moshiach.
Once we poke our heads above the clouds of
the tricky illusions that seem so real,
we are once again surrounded,
this time, not by “Mother” nature,
but by G-d Nature.
24 Tishrei / Oct 26 Shabbat Bereishit
Im a state of sleep
Awakened subtly but abruptly
by the sensation of my bed shaking
Could it be the 3rd time in 7 months that I felt eathquake tremors?
The first was on March 2024, earthquake in Tzfat
the second in May 2024, Lakewood, the epicenter was in... Lebanon, NJ)
It’s a different frequency than
the Missiles, sonic booms and Iron Dome tremors
My mind vascillates:
It IS an earthquake
But it cant be
Yup its an earthquake
It cant be...
And so I resume sleeping
A short while later
I am semi-aware of a loud speaker
Strange... in Tzfat there's no loud speaker announcements on Shabbat.
Our shabbat guests arrive
They ask “Did you hear the sirens?”
No
They were earthquake alarms‼️
A different sound than the dailyl missile sirens
There was an earthquake? Makes sense now.
right!
Moetzei shabbat
We see the news
"An immense set of explosions in Lebanon triggered the Israeli earthquake alarm;
not only that...
Israel struck Iran.
22 Tishrei / Oct 24; Simchat Torah 5785
B'kavana / with intention
On Simchat Torah morning
I returned
To the exact shul
In the exact spot
where I stood
Exactly a year ago
On October 7
Simchat Torah morning, 5784
We were saying Hallel
when suddenly, the vibration increased
was that a siren? (as our voices drowned out the blaring sound)
As I see the young mothers scoot their children inside the shul
I know theres a siren, with the following booms…
...At the EXACT moment when we were saying
these words during Hallel:
כָּל־גּוֹיִ֥ם סְבָב֑וּנִי בְּשֵׁ֥ם יְ֜הֹוָ֗ה כִּ֣י אֲמִילַֽם:
All nations surrounded me;
in the name of Hashem / Havaya
that I shall cut them off.
And you know what EVERYONE
In our holy kehilla / congregation @AQM in Tzfat did
when we heard the siren?
We sang LOUDER!
And how we danced…!
the hakafot were infused and embedded with deep meaning
The women created circle dances
There was a beautiful pure angelic little girl holding a toy sefer Torah
She was determined to catch our attention
each woman, one at a time
to kiss her sefer Torah
You couldn’t escape her beseeching eyes
One by one we kissed her torah
as we swirled with the movement on Oneness in our feminine circle
then, spontaneously, a beautiful young woman
swept the child up in her arms
and held her on her shoulders
Heres the virtual snapshot of the scene:
The little girl was smiling ear to ear
you could see her heart and soul also smiling
as her tender little lips kissed her sefer torah
The beautiful young woman holding her was gleaming, glimmering
reflecting the child she was wearing as a crown on her head
glistening with the gems of the sefer Torah
they were both emanating One Light in the center of Miriam’s Circle
a glimpse of Olam Habah
my mind I heard the song from the “Journeys” album:
We danced round and round in circles as if the world had done no wrong
from evening until morning, filling up the shul with song.
Though we had no Sifrei Torah to gather in our arms
in their place we held those children, the Jewish people would live on
Am Yisrael Chai.
The Jewish people would live on.
I wanted to hold onto the moment forever
The young woman, Miriam, whispered to me afterwards
I felt like she was my inner child, I looked just like her when I was a child.
but the singing stopped as we moved on to the next Hakafa…
For Kol Ha Naarim, when all the children were called up to the Torah, the rebbetzin announced, “we are also calling up the Bibas children, Ariel ben Shiri, Kfir ben Shiri… and all the children who are hostages!”
20 Tishrei / Oct 18; Sunday Chol Hamoed
I write as I sit in my safe space ie: my Stairwell
yet again
on the Yahrzeit of Rabbi Nachman... zt"l.
Missiles are being fired at us now, rather constantly,
we are surrounded by fallen debris from the Iron Dome
piercing our homes & hearts, columns of fire, dust (עמוד אש) and smoke blurring our vistas and
obstructing
tranqulity and purity of breath
flowing through our nostrils
The smokiness was vague
but familiar...
My husband gave words to my semi-conscious thoughts
"Reminiscent of the ovens and fires
In our past generations..."
🎯
Simultaneously feeling embraced and protected
by the ananei haKavod / clouds of glory of our sukkah,
and divinely inspired by the
Hashgacha pratis/ synchronicity
Of the moment
Glimmers of Olam Haba
My ❤️ heart is surrounded / לִבִּי סְחַרְחַר
(Tehillim 38:11). …
Dovid HaMelech
got it so perfectly… yet again
yes... as he actually "Thrived in Chaos"
Rabbi Nachman also thrived in chaos
by actually TRANSMUTING darkness to light
This is the concept of “לִבִּי סְחַרְחַר My heart is s’charchar (surrounded)” (Tehillim 38:11).
For there is a kelipah (an evil force) that contorts and surrounds the heart with much crookedness, contortion and confusion. This is the kelipah of nogah. It is therefore said to be S’ChaRChar, the Aramaic translation of “surrounded,” as in “with a nogah (brightness) surrounding it” (Ezekiel 1:4)
*"כִּי יֵשׁ בְּחִינַת לִבִּי סְחַרְחַר. כִּי יֵשׁ קְלִפָּה שֶׁהִיא מְעַקֶּמֶת וּמְסַבֶּבֶת הַלֵּב בְּעִקּוּמִים וְסִבּוּבִים וּבִלְבּוּלִים הַרְבֵּה, [...] וּכְשֶׁאָדָם נוֹפֵל לְשָׁם, שֶׁזֶּה בְּחִינַת מְקוֹמוֹת הַמְּטֻנָּפִים, וַאֲזַי מְבַקֵּשׁ וְצוֹעֵק 'אַיֵּה' מְקוֹם כְּבוֹדוֹ, וְזֶה בְּעַצְמוֹ תִּקּוּנוֹ, כִּי חוֹזֵר וְשָׁב אֶל הַכָּבוֹד הָעֶלְיוֹן, שֶׁהוּא בְּחִינַת 'אַיֵּה'."* (רבי נחמן מברסלב - מאמר אַיֵּה, ליקוטי מוהר"ן)
19th of Tishrei / Oct 21; 5th day of Sukkot
On the yahrzeit of the Vilna Gaon, the ushpizin is Aaron Hakohen
who was known for his ability to bring peace among the people.
The clouds of glory / ananei hakavod are are in his zechut/ merit,
which represents emuna.
May it be Hashem's will that He help us reach this heightened level of emuna
not through suffering but in a soft, sweet and gentle way
17 Tishrei, Oct 19; SHABBAT CHOL HAMOED
״On Shabbat we were
sitting in our sukkah with guests,
discussing the Ushpizin of that day,
Yakov...
I will attempt to paint this picture for you
With the _koach haDimyon_ / the power imagination
Of the view in front of our eyes
Of these 3 dimensions:
Frontal view: Framed in the screened sukkah window
Background view: surrounded by
Mt Meron / Tiveria / Kinneret / Golan Hts
Middle ground: pillars of smoke
from missile strike from Lebanon, hit ground about an hour prior
Rochel❤️Leah
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News from Tzfat:
Rockets & Joy, Simchat Torah morning, 5785
You wouldn't think that rockets and joy go together but they did this past Simchat Torah in the numerous synagogues in Tzfat. The joy of the holiday was extra exuberant because we were overcoming the darkness of the previous Simchat Torah. In the numerous synagogues throughout Tzfat, men were singing and dancing with the Torah Scrolls and sang louder when there was a siren and the sound of intercepted rockets exploding overhead."
-Yaffa, Recieved via Email
More Excerpts from Rebbetzin Tamar Taback’s
Sukkos Circles
www.thenexus.org
Our sages teach us
that the world is approaching a
circle reality
and that this shift is
deeply related to our ability
to dip into our feminine gifts and share
them.
This is a special piece
that we have to bring to the world at
this time, but of course,
first we need to know what they are.
There are two kinds of circles.
This first kind encloses and suffocates
spirituality and the second kind is spirituality itself.
The former is
what I call the
lower feminine nature
and the latter
The higher feminine nature.
As pre-messianic women
we are reaching up
towards the higher expression
of our femininity
and as such we have
an affinity with the second circle.
And if you haven’t figured out
already…
the higher feminine
is expressed through a different sort of
“ס“, samech, not the one that is the first letter of the Satan but the
samech that is the first letter of the word Sukka. Hence, the Sukka is
an icon for femininity redeemed!
... “Hevel Havalim, vanity of vanities…
“ This does not describe a life of Torah and mitzvot?
How can this book be
included in Tanach?
“All is vain under the sun”…. in the world of
nature, yes, that’s true! It is a cycle that moves from birth to death,
blossom to wilting…. And ends in the grave. “But!” say the sages,
“this is only true for those
who live inside the circle!
Who live under
the sun,
vulnerable to the inevitable vicissitudes of life.
Not so for the realm above the sun!
For above the sun, that is the realm of
Torah, and the home for all that is spiritual. There, nothing is Hevel,
nothing is futile.
Eternity is built by every kind word,
every mitzvah,
every word of Torah!
This is akin to drowning in nature
and falling into the abyss of the
circle and the lower feminine.
It is why the Satan was created with
woman, because a circle without a line is a physical world without
Torah.
The Aishes Chayil
is married to the Torah scholar and the
higher feminine is in relationship with the masculine, with Torah and with Hashem. Her circle is not futile.
It is a circle with a line and is
forever redeemed.
Once we grab onto the rope, the kav,
the line leading out of the
circle, we enter into a new world.
Just outside the circumscribed
space that was the scene of Hashem’s tzimtzum and set the stage
for reality to unfold still exists His infinite Light.
…We have stepped out of our homes of brick and mortar and find ourselves in a
Sukka. The Zohar says that the Sukka is none other than Hashem’s
embrace. It encircles us on all sides and becomes the new normal
for the period of the 7/8 days of Sukkos. Chassidic texts describe
the infinite expanse outside of the circle that demarcates our
physical world as the aspect of Hashem that is called סובב
כל העלמין – the One who encircles all of creation[5]. This is the “ס “at the end
of Sefer Koheles, written in big, “The sum total of it all. Fear G-d!”
Grab onto the line that He has cast you and pull yourself up and
over. Hashem’s embrace is the most eternal love of all.
…
Hevel. Vanity of vanities. This is a “schedule 6” remedy for the
soul. Shlomo Hamelech speaks with accuracy what we would rather
not admit to be the state of our human psyches without Torah. It
jump-starts us to contemplate the true nature of our lives and our
strivings.
When we find the kav, the line, the ray of Light coming
from the outside of the circle penetrating inside, we step into the
reality that only what is above the sun is real, only the Sukka is real,
only Hashem’s love is real. And that, indeed, makes us very, very
happy.
Our sages couldn’t have chosen a better time to read the
book of Koheles. It is hard to understand this with our minds
only. But to our soul, it makes perfect sense