Ki Thavo: Are we there yet?

The journey is long. The child asks again and again and again: are we there yet?  Is this an opportunity  to teach Zeno's paradox? We can never get there.  We can, possibly, get arbitrarily close, but there is no there there. 

So the pioneer declares: Now I declare ...  that I have arrived... Perception is what matters.  The arrival invokes obligations.  The parsha starts with taxes,  the first fruits, income tax  Arrival involves the blessing of becoming a tax payer, paying dues for the privilege of ownership. 

Every day, several tines  each day, I pronounce the hope that Jerusalem will be rebuilt.  This week, I attended my daughter's wedding in the cities of Judah, in the outskirts of Jerusalem.  There we heard the call of joy and gladness, the voice of the groom and bride. We saw the prophecy fulfilled.  And glasses (wrapped in aluminum foil) were broken while singing a song longing for the restoration of Jerusalem.  We were surrounded by a city of 600,000 longing for a capital of 10,000 that was destroyed 2000 years ago.  

We are there when we declare it, when we pay taxes and dues, when we accept the obligation of place, to protect and defend all the people of our place.  We are there when the system is viable, when the rules apply. 

Are we there yet. Zeno?