We Can Wait – Pesach 5786 |
There are moments in history when time itself seems to change shape—when days no longer feel like days, and weeks stretch into something heavier, something more enduring. Since the horrors of October 7, in what is now widely referred to as the October 7 attacks, many in Israel have begun to speak not in the language of weeks or even months, but in years. This is not a war people expect to end quickly. It is not a campaign with a clear horizon. It is, increasingly, understood as a prolonged struggle—one that will demand not only military endurance, but emotional, spiritual, and national resilience.
And with that realization comes something even more difficult: the quiet, unspoken fear that some may not be able to endure it. That the weight of constant threat, the drumbeat of sirens, the uncertainty about the future, may drive people to leave. Not out of lack of love, but out of exhaustion. Not out of abandonment, but out of desperation.
This is not the first time Jews have faced such a moment.
The Torah tells us that the Israelites were enslaved in Egypt for 400 years. Four centuries. It is almost impossible to comprehend that span of time—not just the physical suffering, but the psychological toll. Generations were born into bondage. Generations died without ever seeing freedom. Hope itself must have felt fragile, even foolish.
And yet, the story did not end there.
The book of Exodus opens with a cry that reverberates across time:“וַיֵּאָנְחוּ בְנֵי־יִשְׂרָאֵל מִן־הָעֲבֹדָה… וַתַּעַל שַׁוְעָתָם אֶל־הָאֱלֹהִים”“The Israelites groaned from the labor… and their cry rose up to God” (Exodus 2:23).
The Torah does not sanitize the experience. It does not pretend that faith erased suffering. It tells us plainly: they groaned. They cried. They despaired. And still, something in them reached upward.
That tension—between despair and hope—is where we find ourselves now.
For many Israelis today, life has taken on a new and unsettling rhythm. The sounds of ordinary life are punctuated by alerts and interruptions. Parents carry a heightened awareness for their children’s safety. Soldiers—many of them reservists pulled from civilian life—move between worlds, from home to front and back again. The question is no longer “when will this end?” but........