Night and Day

There are two elements to one day, what we call daytime and what we call nighttime- daytime being when the sun is out and things are bright and nighttime being when the sun is set and things are dark. Rebbe Nachman of Breslov teaches that the darkness of night represents the difficult times in life. Just as we grope in the dark without direction and unable to avoid stumbling blocks and obstacles, so too when we are going through difficult periods in our lives we often feel at a loss for direction and purpose. Lacking a guiding light we can often fall victim to despair. The daytime, however, refers to the more enjoyable periods of life, those times when we see the path laid out ahead of us and feel a degree of security.

There are two ways of approaching the order of day- the Jewish way and the non-Jewish way. The non-Jews, usually using a solar calender, hold that the day begins with the morning and that the nighttime represents the end of that particular day. Conversely the Jews, using a mainly lunar-based calendar, view a day as beginning with the evening and the actual daytime as being the latter part of the day. This is why Shabbat and other Jewish holidays always begin in the evening and last until the evening of the following day. This concept doesn't just apply to the calendar, but rather is a principle Hashem has put into the universe of which many things, one of which happens to be time, adhere to. For it says in B'reishit (Genesis) "And there was evening and there was morning, one day." Since the time of creation it has been a principle of the universe that first there is a period of darkness and afterwards it is followed by the period of light.

Rebbe Nachman teaches that therefore, when going through difficult times we can take comfort in the fact that though things may be difficult at the moment, it is guaranteed that eventually the light will shine forth in our lives and things will become better as it is a fundamental principle G-d has put into the world, and all we must do is hold out long enough to see our personal redemption come from whatever the obstacles may be. But if both the darkness and the light are part of a system setup by G-d, this begs the question why does G-d desire us to pass through this alternating experience of hardship and redemption in the first place? Obviously G-d doesn't do it for His own amusement as He is far beyond simple human thinking such as that, and because of His great love for us He only does what's in our best interest never subjects us to needless suffering. So it must be that He puts us through these processes in order that we should grow. People who stay in their comfort zone tend to grow lazy and slump whereas those who are held up against the fire of adversity are forced to grow and overcome in order to survive. This puts an interesting responsibility into our hands... since these life situations are presented to us in order that we should grow it seems incumbent upon us to actually see to it that when we come out of our "nights" into our "days", we have taken something away from the experience and grow to become a better human being. To do so is to fulfill G-d's will, to fail to do so is to essentially waste an opportunity provided to us by Him.

Human civilization is currently in the era of the Arab. As the western world sets into decline, the Muslim world in general, and particularly the Arab world is filling in the power vacuum and vying for ultimate control of the direction in which to steer humanity. This is mainly through Arab oil influence and its choke hold on international policy combined with the growing boldness of militant Islam and the western world's lack of effort to curb either. It seems as if conflicts driven by this change are sparking up in virtually every place across the world... the aggressive spread of Islam, or "terrorism" as it is most often referred to affects almost every group of people in every place to some degree or another. Often fought by underground militias which blend in with the civilians in major population centers as well as in the media and across the internet, those who oppose this movement are often at a loss for means to fight it, as its tactics are radically different from organized state militaries of the enemies of yesteryear. As more nations and peoples succumb to tolerance and eventual social if not military surrender of this movement, those left opposed to it face a world of fear and darkness and seemingly greater conflict that what is already upon us lays ahead.

In Hebrew the word for Arab (ARaVi) [ ערבי] and the word for evening (EReV) [ערב] share the same root, Ayin-Resh-Bet (the word for Arab only differing by having an additional letter Yud at the end). As the age of the Arab (ARaVi) sets in the world is indeed starting to fall into a deep darkness- a worldwide darkness of night (EReV). However as we discussed earlier, there are two different views to what evening means- the Jewish one of the day beginning and the non-Jewish one of the day coming to a close. Therefore this era is marking an incredible transition in the history of humanity, that from an age of a non-Jewish based experience and thinking to that of Jewish based thinking and experience. What exactly does this mean? As already stated, Hashem desires people to go through the nighttime-daytime experience so that they should emerge more developed. So too perhaps humanity as a whole is currently undergoing such a process.

And just what is the development that the world as a whole must gain through all this? A new perspective and relationship to G-d. The Ben Ish Chai, Gaon Chayim Yosef of Baghdad, comments on how in the morning prayers we recite "Hashem melech, Hashem malach, Hashem yimloch l'olam vaed" (Hashem reigns, Hashem has reigned, Hashem will reign forever) not in the order of past present and future but rather out of order starting with the present. He says this is because our faith in Hashem ruling over the past and the future is based in recognition that He currently reigns as evident through the miracles He does for us in these times. Having described the Jewish recognition of G-d, the morning prayers continue several paragraphs later to describe the differing recognition of G-d that the non-Jews will eventually have in future times when it says, "V'yomru bagoyim Hashem malach, Hashem melech, Hashem malach, Hashem yimloch l'olam vaed" (And the nations will say Hashem has reigned, Hashem reigns, Hashem has reigned, Hashem will reign forever). This recognition of Hashem differs from that of the Jewish nation as explained by the Ben Ish Chai in that it seems the future non-Jewish recognition of Hashem currently reigning and reigning for all future times are both first preceded by the statement that Hashem has reigned in the past.

Thus we can see the future nature of the non-Jews' relationship to Hashem and infer about their current relationship. The Jews currently recognize Hashem and His mandate over the universe entire, and all past or future aspects of His rule correspond to the same G-d who we currently recognize rules right now. Yet the G-d of Israel is also the G-d of the rest of the world and the father of all of humanity. It is His desire that all people in His world should come to know Him and forge a relationship with Him. Unfortunately, the non-Jewish nations of the world have not been able to achieve the perception of G-d that the nation of Israel has via the Torah that G-d gave to it as well as the revelations to the patriarchs Abraham, Issac, Jacob and to the entire nation at Mount Sinai. Yet once the world emerges from the current "dark of night" that it is currently in, it will have gained a new development from the night-day cycle. With the coming "light of day" and the arrival of Moshiach (the Jewish Messiah) the world will come to see the truth of Torah and finally recognize Hashem, the G-d of Israel, as the one true sovereign of the world. Once this occurs, unlike the Jews who currently proclaim Hashem as king, the non-Jewish nations will realize that it was Hashem who ruled all along and therefore because of that realization of the past they will also realize that it is Hashem who reigns currently; so too they will see that just as it was Hashem who reigned before it is Hashem that will reign in the future of all time. Thus the morning prayers say that they will proclaim "Hashem has reigned" each time before declaring that He currently reigns and will in the future.

May G-d grant us the patience and strength to endure the current and coming dark times so that we may survive to see the coming times of light that will follow, in our own lives as well as the world over.