Healing Well of Miriam

I was visiting a friend in Frankfurt, Germany for Passover in 1985.  On a table in her foyer I saw an announcement of an event scheduled for September 15^th of that year.  What specifically caught my eye was the picture of the Zepplin Stadium in Nuremberg, because I remembered being there with my parents and my sister in 1964, when I was nine-years-old.  I picked up the flyer and read that the date of the event, September 15, 1985, was the fiftieth anniversary of Germany’s passing of the Nuremberg Laws, also known as the Blood Preservation Laws, or “The Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honour.”  My mind went back to that bitter cold December day when I had stood looking up at that edifice, thinking how glad I was that Hitler and the Nazi regime had been defeated.  But, along with that thought, I was also deeply shaken, for I had not been aware of the specifics of the racist laws that had spawned so much suffering and death in the world. 

These laws, declared at the Zepplin stadium during a Nazi rally on September 15, 1935, were only the beginning of Reichstag legislation that paved the way for the Holocaust.  They prohibited marriages and intimate relationships between Jews and Germans.  They also barred Jews from employing Germans in their households.  This began the categorization of their society’s undesirable races, which would also include Romani people and Afro-Germans.  Jews would be stripped of German citizenship, and even veterans of World War I would be forbidden to display the nation’s colors.

September 15, 1985, fifty years from the very day of that infamous Nazi rally, was a type of Jubilee—a grand re-set, a time of release of the captives, of restoration of heritage or legacy.  In addition to that incredible timing, while September 15^th in 1935 had fallen in Elul of that year, fifty years later September 15^th on the Gregorian calendar coincided with Rosh Hashana—the first of Tishrei—on the Hebrew calendar. 

Rosh Hashana is said to be the birthday of Adam, and thus begins a reflective time of judgment for all the people and creatures of the world.  Also called the Day of Remembrance (Yom HaZicharon), the Courts of Heaven convene to judge not just the lives of individuals—who will live and who will die—but nations.  We can imagine the ministering angel of each nation pleading his case.  How much rain will fall in his nation?  Will the people be prosperous or poor?  Will they have peace or war?  Will there be plenty or famine?  Will they be healthy or sick?  Will the weather be temperate or harsh?  Will his country be forgiven or face retribution?  Whatever the judgment on Rosh Hashana, ten days later, on Yom Kippur it is sealed.  These are the Days of Awe, when all stand before the Master of the Universe.

On September 15, 1985, Israeli banners were unfurled on the walls of the Zepplin stadium in the very places where Nazi banners had been.  While I did have the amazing privilege of helping to advertise the event, I had moved from Germany in May and was unable to attend.  I was told that about five thousand people attended, albeit, not the official representatives of any governments.  In fact, Ari Ben Israel, the organizer of the event, told me that he did not get positive responses from national leaders.  Yet, individual people came to remember and to repent—for themselves and for their nations.  One speaker after another recounted experiences of the Holocaust.  Then, it was recounted, a gentle rain began to fall, as though Heaven was crying with the crowd.   

This year, 2025, the United Nations convened at this very period of time, and it is not just ambassadors of nations, but the leaders themselves addressing the assembly. President Trump addressed the assembly on September 23^rd, which was Rosh Hashana itself. Just imagine the ministering angels listening to their nations’ presidents, prime ministers, and kings!…because they have been!      

The hot topic on the agenda is the recognition of a Palestinian state.  The nations seem to have forgotten that Gaza was, for all intents and purposes, an independent state, into which the international community poured billions and billions of dollars.  If they had seriously wanted a flourishing state for their people, they had an opportunity—free of any Jewish presence, because all the Jews were forcibly removed in 2005.  For twenty years, and with unimaginable amounts of money, they had the opportunity to build a thriving state.  Instead, they built a terror base to continue their war to annihilate Israel.  Before that, in the 1990s and 2000s, agreements were made with the Palestinian Authority, which were supposed to be implemented in stages to prove their trustworthiness in building a peaceful state alongside Israel.  Although there were blatant, horrific violations at every stage, Israel was pushed to continue as though all was well.  The point is that opportunities have been given, the Palestinians have proven they cling to their ambition to wipe out Israel—and every living Jew, according to Hamas—but the nations of the world seem to be oblivious to this. 

When Benjamin Netanyahu was called to speak at the UN on Friday, September 26^th, a vast number of people from various nations got up to leave the assembly hall.  The Jerusalem Post reported that this exaggerated display was concocted, with people having been instructed to attend for the specific purpose of making this show of dissent, leaving a disserted looking room.  Israel’s Prime Minister went ahead with his speech, shaming nations whose recognition of a Palestinian state was tantamount to rewarding terrorism.  Then he said it seems most people had forgotten the massacres of October 7, 2023, when more than 1200 Israelis were slaughtered by terrorists—homes invaded, people butchered and burned alive, babies beheaded, one baby put alive into an oven in front of his parents, women brutally raped, and people kidnapped and taken into cruel captivity in Gaza.  Prime Minister Netanyahu said people could see the footage by taking a picture of the QR code on the button on his jacket.  What he did not add was that this footage was taken by the terrorists themselves, proudly bragging about killing Jews.  He did note that Hamas vowed to do October 7^th again and again and again, until all the Jews of the world were dead.  That sounds like other voices we have heard throughout history, and some not so long ago.  Something else he did not add was the passage from Zechariah in which Hashem addresses the nations that oppose Israel:

Thus said Hashem, Master of Legions:  “I have become zealous for Jerusalem and for Zion, a great zeal; and I am wrathful, a great wrath against the complacent nations, who, when I became slightly wrathful augmented the evil.” –Zechariah 1:14-15

Do these nations, who seek to display their self-righteous indignation against Israel before the entire world even have the slightest clue what they are doing?!  Do they not have any understanding whatsoever that Hashem will not abandon Israel…and what that means for them?  When Israel’s prime minister was criticizing their choices, he was actually doing them a favor of warning them of the consequences of those choices—both in this world and beyond.

Timing is very important.  Fifty years after the passing of the Nuremberg Laws, on Rosh Hashana, at the very location of their declaration, Germany and the nations had an opportunity for repentance and mitigation of retribution.  So, too, this year the nations of the world had the opportunity to meet—on Rosh Hashana—and denounce terrorism.  Rather, many declared an entrenched position, repeating the “two-state solution” platitudes.    But the words of Hashem continue through Zechariah:

Therefore, thus said Hashem:  “I have returned to Jerusalem in mercy; My Temple will be rebuilt in it”—the word of Hashem, Master of Legions—”and a plumb line will be stretched out over Jerusalem.”  Call out again, saying, “Thus said Hashem, Master of Legions: ‘My cities will once again spread out with bounty; Hashem will have mercy on Zion once again and He will choose Jerusalem once again.’”—Zechariah 1:16-17

Yes, timing is important.  On September 17, 2025, there was an inauguration ceremony for the Pilgrimage Road in the City of David.  Participating along with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were US Ambassador Mike Huckabee and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.  Why was this significant right before this session of the UN?   It is because this was the ancient road pilgrims walked to the Temple.  This is the road for peoples of all nations to ascend to the House of Prayer for all Peoples.  This is ultimately the path to peace for all the world.