Vizoth Hanracha: Now what?

Vizoth Hanracha: Now what?

We call this last parsha of the Torah, the one that does not have a Shabbath associated with it, "And these are the Blessings"   This week, Eitham and Naama Henkin z'l, like Moshe in the parsha,  passed into the world of blessing

וַיִּסְעוּ מִסֻּכֹּת; וַיַּחֲנוּ בְאֵתָם בִּקְצֵה הַמִּדְבָּר" שמות י"ג כ'. 

This verse in Shemoth is the only place the word Eitham appears in the Torah.  It is the name of the place that the Israelites went, the place were they were assigned the guiding  pillars of cloud  and fire, the signals that would conduct their passage through the wilderness to the promised land.  This is the name that R. Yehuda  and R. Chana Henkin gave their son, the son that was murdered in a cloud of smoke that came from the firing of a gun, while he and his wife and children were driving through the wilderness. 

Eitham's father was my guiding cloud.  R. Yehuda Henkin showed me Zionism. What I leaned in Mizrachi Hatzair put my life in perspective.  Israel was the answer to the Holocaust. I come from an ancient  tradition of  longing for Zion, a tradition  that my parents truly carried in their hearts and that they could trace back indefinitely. In Mizrachi, (pre 1967)  religious Zionism, it all converged.  There could be nothing closer to where I belong. It stuck with me, it formed my core social life, a longing that I transmitted to my children ( Shoshana, my middle daughter,r is making Aliya in 2 weeks; Elisheva is in Israel now; Jack works for AIPAC ). It is, possibly,  the most important formative experience of my life. 

And it is like a cloud. ideas that do not have a defined shape. The Holocaust means that my people need a haven. The modern state of Israel is that haven. Israel is the fulfillment of a prophecy, but the statement of that prophecy needs interpretation,  The displacement and disenfranchisement of populations  is a  crimes that cannot be imitated.  Permission to maintain a Judenrien zone, in a territory that Jews consider their ancestral homeland, cannot be taken for granted. 

Eitham and Naama Henkin pass from being children, parents, teachers to being symbols and martyrs Their parents were a true bracha for me. May their memories be a bracha and ay their parents find comfort in all the lives they improved.