In the wake of October 7, 2023, the Jewish world finds itself caught in a global “mishearing” of staggering proportions. Across the streets of world capitals, narratives of “occupation” and “resistance” are weaponized to drown out the explicit genocidal intent of Hamas’s charter. We see a cacophony where anti-Zionism and antisemitism blur, threatening to isolate the Jewish state at a moment of profound vulnerability.

Domestically, the lead-up to that dark day revealed a different kind of internal mishearing. Debates over national security, judicial reform, and identity fractured our unity, creating a din where warnings were often dismissed as political noise. This distance between hearing and heeding is not a new phenomenon; it is a haunting echo of a spiritual deafness that has defined the thin line between survival and catastrophe throughout Jewish history.

This week’s Torah portion, Va’era, provides a stark archetype of this deafness. Pharaoh is confronted with the Divine demand to “Let My people go,” yet he remains trapped in a cycle of refusal. Despite the mounting evidence of the plagues, Pharaoh does not hear or heed. Instead, his heart is hardened by a desperate desire to maintain his empire and preserve his power. He........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)