פרשת החודש Parashat HaChodesh: Why is this year different?
That question has been quietly forming within me these past days…
Earlier today I stepped outside my home determined to get some sun. I have found myself indoors more often recently as the situation in the north has intensified. Yet what I feel most strongly is not fear. It is something quieter. A calm awareness. A sense of zechut to be here in this Land, living at a moment when events unfold with a clarity that allows us to witness nisim /miracles as they unfold in realtime.
From where I sat there is a sweeping view toward Har Meron. The sky above the Galil was clear and expansive, the kind of blue that seems almost translucent.
As I looked upward, I suddenly noticed a brilliant white line tracing itself across the sky. At first it looked like a jet leaving a long arc of vapor behind it. For a moment, I felt something above nature, surreal, happening overhead… almost like watching someone sketching across the heavens.
🎨 פרשת החודש / Parashat HaChodesh: Why is this year different?
That question has been quietly forming within me these past days.
Earlier today I stepped outside my home determined to get some sun. I have found myself indoors more often recently as the situation in the north has intensified. Yet what I feel most strongly is not fear. It is something quieter. A calm awareness. A sense of zechut to be here in this Land, living at a moment when events unfold with a clarity that allows us to witness nisim /miracles as they unfold in realtime.
From where I sat there is a sweeping view toward Har Meron. The sky above the Galil was clear and expansive, the kind of blue that seems almost translucent.
As I looked upward, I suddenly noticed a brilliant white line tracing itself across the sky. At first it looked like a jet leaving a long arc of vapor behind it. For a moment, I felt something above nature, surreal, happening overhead… almost like watching someone sketching across the heavens.
The curve was so graceful that I instinctively reached for my phone to capture it. But as I fumbled with the camera, two more white lines appeared, drawn quickly across the blue. Then another straight line shot up and intersected them.
Then my phone alarm sounded.
Then I heard the local siren.
A moment later came the anticipated boom.
Only then did it register that what I had been watching was not a jet at all. These were interceptions. The lines and arcs were the visible traces of the Iron Dome ברזל system responding in real time.
I made my way to the bomb shelter / miklat, said Tehilim … and breathed.
A grandfather arrived at the miklat the same moment with several small grandchildren. One little boy ran toward him and saba lifted him easily into his arms. There was something deeply human and tender in that gesture, the kind of quiet strength that feels so familiar in this Land.
After the sirens faded, we stepped outside again and instinctively looked upward. The white cloud left behind by the interception still lingered above us, slowly widening and drifting across the sky. The saba pointed gently and said to the children, almost casually, “That’s where the booms were.”
We all stood there together for a few quiet moments, watching the faint white sketches gradually dissolve back into the blue. The sky has a way of erasing its own drawings quickly, as if nothing had happened. Yet for those few minutes the marks remained, delicate traces of something both technological and miraculous.
A little while later I returned to my seat at the overlook. The hills were calm again. Every so often a distant boom echoed across the landscape like roaring lions, softened by a safe distance. Yet the atmosphere itself felt strangely serene, as if the land and the birds had already absorbed the moment and returned to its quiet rhythm.
As I sat there, I kept returning to the shapes I had just witnessed.
Lines and circles.
Arcs opening outward.
Curves intersecting.
For a brief moment the sky had become a kind of living canvas…
It stirred a memory of my father a”h. Each evening he would sit in his chair, with the Milford Daily News in hand while watching the news, with a seriousness that belonged to another generation. The television flickered (war like images) in the center of the room while commentators explained events happening somewhere far away (like Vietnam :). We learned about the world through images transmitted across cables and satellites, mediated by anchors and analysts. The images gave me nightmares.
But here, in this moment, there was no screen.
No studio lights.
No voiceover narrating what was happening.
The sky itself had become the broadcast.
The Ribbon Shel Olam / Master of the World, Himself, was the broadcaster.
White arcs slowly etched themselves across the blue like chalk on a vast celestial board. A line curved gently, another cut across it with precision, and then a soft cloud blossomed where the interception had occurred, expanding outward before dissolving into the late afternoon light. For a few fleeting minutes the heavens carried the visual record of what had just taken place.
Protection was not an abstract idea.
It was visible.
Unfolding in real time above our heads.
And we stood there together, an unlikely audience of neighbors and children and a saba holding his grandson, quietly watching the sky complete its brief announcement before returning to its silence.
Points of light.
Lines.
Curves.
Circles.
And what struck me even more was the realization that this was happening very close by, just down the hill near the קבר / kever of the Holy Ari האר״י / Lion ;)
In the language of the Arizal, these forms carry profound meaning.
עיגולים / igulim
קו הישר / kav hayashar
The Arizal teaches that creation unfolds through two fundamental patterns of Divine flow. First come עיגולים / igulim, encompassing circles of Divine אור / light that surround and sustain reality. Then emerges קו הישר / kav hayashar, the directed line of Divine flow that enters the center and gives structure to the world.
These are concepts we usually encounter quietly inside sefarim, perhaps drawn as careful diagrams in the margins of a notebook. Yet standing beneath the sky today, watching arcs curve outward and straight lines cut across them, it felt as though that ancient language had briefly become distinctly visible again.
Circles surrounding.
Lines directing.
And all of this unfolding only moments away from the resting place of the tzadik, the Arizal who revealed these teachings to the world!
This was a moment to share and engrave in our collective memory…
As if Shamayim had briefly opened a window into the deeper architecture of Divine protection.
And so I return to the question with which we began….
Why is this Adar / Nissan different?
Because this year we are not only reading about geula.
We are witnessing hints of it drawn by the Master Creator across the sky.
And that brings us to the Parashat HaChodesh...
*30 days leading to Pesach our neshamot are gradually purified through these gates of katnus.*
Based on the teachings of Rav Morgenstern
When the moon of Nissan begins to reappear, something subtle begins to move in our inner world as well. Many of us had experienced these weeks simply as the rush toward Pesach. Homes must be cleaned, closets emptied, food prepared, lists made. Yet beneath the activity there is a deeper current that we are being invited us to notice.
החודש הזה לכם ראש חודשים / This month shall be for you the beginning of months
שמות יב ב
בניסן נגאלו ובניסן עתידין להיגאל / In Nissan they were redeemed and in Nissan they will be redeemed in the future
ראש השנה יא
This teaching suggests that Nissan carries a recurring pattern. Every year the same movement toward geula becomes available again.
The Torah’s phrase החודש הזה לכם / this month shall be for you means HaKadosh Baruch Hu gives Am Yisrael the power of מלכות / malchut through this mitzvah.
Malchut is the dimension of reality where the שכינה / Shechina rests. It is the place of receptivity, awareness, and presence. In a very personal way, each of us carries a small mishkan inside our heart where the Shechina can dwell. Nissan invites us to gently rebuild that place.
Many before Pesach they feel the opposite of elevation. The house becomes intense, the days feel compressed, the body feels tired. The sefer שמן ששון / Shemen Sason teaches that before Pesach we pass through חמישים שערי קטנות / fifty gates of katnus. Katnus refers to a state of contraction or smallness of consciousness. Similarly, the sefer חסד לאברהם / Chesed l’Avraham explains that in the 30 days leading to Pesach our neshamot are gradually purified through these gates of katnus. From the perspective of pnimiut work this is deeply compassionate teaching. It means that the heaviness we sometimes feel during these weeks is not a failure... It is part of the cleansing process that prepares the vessel.
From Rosh Chodesh Nissan until Pesach we move through a quiet inner journey... as a passage from ivdut / bondage to geula. Bondage does not only refer to the historical experience in Mitzrayim. It also refers to the subtle ways the heart becomes constricted.
Sometimes we notice this as tension in the body, tightness in the breath, or a sense that the heart has become closed or distant.
The arrival of Nissan carries a particular spiritual capacity to soften that inner closure. The reading of פרשת החודש / Parashat HaChodesh awakens the possibility that the heart can open again.
In the language of Torat HaTzeva, this opening often begins with simple awareness.:
As you move through the many preparations of these days, pause for a moment and notice the body. Notice where the breath is held. Notice where the shoulders tighten or the jaw hardens. Instead of pushing these sensations away, allow the breath to soften them gently. This is a small but real act of inner geula. Each moment of awareness begins to rebuild the inner sanctuary where the Shechina rests.
The sefer עבודת ישראל / Avodat Yisrael describes a beautiful structure that begins with ראש חודש ניסן / Rosh Chodesh Nissan. From this day we begin approaching the Shechina through the Divine name אדנ״י / Adnus.
The first 10 days of the month correspond to the letter י / yud,
the following four days until ערב פסח / Erev Pesach correspond to ד / daled,
the 50 days from Pesach until Shavuot correspond to נ / nun,
and the single day of שבועות / Shavuot corresponds to א / aleph.
Through this journey the awareness of HaKadosh Baruch Hu as Master of the world gradually becomes revealed. What begins quietly on Rosh Chodesh Nissan ultimately flowers on Shavuot.
When we understand the month this way, the outer preparations of Pesach take on a different feeling. Each act of cleaning can mirror a small inner clearing. Each moment of fatigue can remind us that the vessel is being refined. Even the moments of katnus become part of the sacred preparation. Slowly, without drama, we begin building the inner Beis HaMikdash.
And within that quiet sanctuary, the light of גאולה / geula begins to appear again.
🎨 Torat HaTzeva Practice for Nissan
As we prepare for Pesach, something beautiful is already happening beneath the surface.