A Purifying Fire

10 Menachem Av 5783
Erev Shabbat Kodesh
Parashah Va'Etchanan - Shabbat Nachamu

"For You Hashem, with fire You consumed her

and with fire You will rebuild her,...."

(From the Nacheim prayer of the Tisha b'Av Minchah service)

Expounding on the verses in Ezekiel and Daniel, the sages of the Talmud [Yoma 77a] and Midrash give a description of what took place in heaven when it came time for the Holy Temple to be set on fire:

The Holy One, Blessed be He, said to Michael, the ministering angel of the Jewish people: Michael, your nation has sinned.

[Michael] replied: Master of the Universe, may it be enough for the good people among them to save them from destruction.

[G‑d] said to him: I will burn them and the good among them [because the good do not rebuke the wicked].

Immediately [G‑d spoke to Gabriel, as the verse states]: “He spoke to the man clothed in linen and said: Go in between the wheelwork and beneath the cherub, and fill your hands with coals of fire from between the cherubs, and scatter them over the city; and he came before my eyes.” Immediately: “And the cherub stretched out his hand from between the cherubs into the fire that was between the cherubs, and took and put it into the hands of him that was clothed in linen, who took it and went out.”  (Source)

~  SHABBAT SHALOM UMEVORACH ~