Of Lublin

Picture of the Week Eight:

I took this picture in the Old Jewish quarter of Lublin . . . my favorite of all the Polish cities (I never had a chance to go to Krakow, but it seems to have become to touristy -just as Majdanek is far more raw then Auschwitz, Lublin seems to still sit somewhere in the mists between today and the past)

The lady walking forlornly down the cobblestone streets of a former bastion of Judaism struck a cord in me that resonated with the emotions of Majdanek . . .

Taken from my post last year on Parshas Yisro:

The giving of the Torah was an epoch not only in Jewish history but world History . . .
-It was the only time that G-d revealed Himself in all of His essence to a people until Moshiach comes.
-It was the beginning of Judaism as it's known -a religion which would later effect the whole of world history.

-Most importantly: Until the giving of the Torah, G-d had decreed that
what was spiritual and holy would remain in the domain of the Divine,
what was physical would be solely relevant to the mundane . . . At
Mount Sinai the two were allowed to merge together as a new whole, an
unprecedented event. From that point on, a physical cow . . . one that
says 'Moo' and eats grass, could be taken and uplifted . . . Even today
after the destruction of the Holy Temple and the cessation of the daily
Sacrifices, a Cow can be taken -it's skin used to make Tefillin and
Mezuzos, a Torah Scroll and it's flesh eaten as part of the Mitzvah of
enjoying Shabbos . . .
Why? Because only the physical is able to
truly bring out the infinite Essence of G-d . . . that even down here
where His Presence is hidden -it can be revealed.

A Good Shabbos Yidden

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