Many, many years ago I recall asking my father zichrono livracha what our attitude is to the discipline of history. History analyzes historical events, seeks to identify natural causes and and patterns which gave rise to historical events. So how do we ma'aminim bnei ma'aminim, how do we relate to that given our belief in the yad Hashem which guides the course of history? And he explained to me at the time that that one of the wondrous expressions of chochmas haborei is how those two levels, the natural and the supernatural, the physical and the metaphysical levels, are in sync. And that things unfold simultaneously, both on a natural level as well as a supernatural level, on a physical level as well as a metaphysical level. And the existence of one in no way precludes or in any way diminishes the existence or the ultimate reality of the other. Ad kan devarav as as recalled. Yitachen the Rambam very famously in Peirush Hamishnayos commenting on the meimar Chazal about the עשרה דברים שנבראו בין השמשות speaking about miracles in the natural world says that Hakadosh Baruch Hu embedded these miracles in nature from sheshes yemei bereishis. Hakadosh Baruch Hu knows the future, Hakadosh Baruch Hu doesn't need to improvise as need arises. So he embedded the miracles into nature. There's a one-time convergence of factors and forces which yield a unique miraculous outcome. Yitachen that miracles in the historical realm unfold along the same pattern. That there too there's an unprecedented convergence of different forces and factors which yield something previously unimaginable, unthinkable, clearly a miraculous turn of events and yet embedded in the natural course of events. Hakadosh Baruch Hu tells Moshe Rabbeinu when Moshe Rabbeinu asks for yedias Hashem, וראית את אחרי ופני לא יראו. Rav Soloveitchik once darshanned that that what it means is, what does it mean panim ve'achor, what's the metaphor of panim ve'achor? That prospectively looking forward one can't discern yad Hashem, but looking retrospectively... You'll see Hakadosh Baruch Hu says, you'll see my footprints in the sands of history looking retrospectively. The reason that's the case that prospectively we're not able to discern Yad Hashem, the Rambam writes in Perek Yud-Aleph of Hilchos Melachim in a passage that was for centuries missing because of censorship. He talks about how even though the effect of the rise of Christianity was to cause so much death and destruction amongst Kal Yisroel Rachmana Litzlan, להחליף את התורה ולהטות רוב העולם לעבוד אלוה מבלעדי השם,
and yet says the Rambam, אבל מחשבות בורא עולם אין כח באדם להשיגם. The thoughts of the creator man doesn't have the capacity to apprehend, to grasp, כי לא דרכינו דרכיו ולא מחשבותינו מחשבותיו. Our ways are not his ways, our thoughts are not his thoughts. וכל הדברים האלו של ישוע הנוצרי ושל זה הישמעאלי שעמד אחריו אינן אלא ליישר דרך למלך המשיח ולתקן העולם כולו לעבודת השם ביחד.
Why these tactics, why these strategies, why history unfolds along these lines, לא דרכינו דרכיו ולא מחשבותינו מחשבותיו אין בו כח באדם להשיג מחשבות הבורא.
But the Rambam says all of this is clearly a linear historical movement towards Acharis hayamim, towards Yemos hamashiach, towards a time of ומלאה הארץ דעה את השם. Generally speaking, because of this principle of מחשבות הבורא אין כח באדם להשיגם, it's, it's folly, it's foolhardy to think that one can discern an expression of Yad Hashem, an expression of Hashgacha in, in the present. And yet it's perhaps difficult for, for your generation to, to have perspective, but the past, the developments in, in the world the past thirty years were so previously unthinkable, unimaginable, beyond belief and have had the effect of totally, totally upsetting the entire world order. No one ever, ever in their wildest dreams or, or flights of imagination thought that the autocratic Soviet Union would ever implode. In more recent years, all the, the revolution and the civil war throughout the Middle East, all these things unthinkable, unimaginable. Throughout all this upheaval, what the right term is... Without recklessly engaging in Messianic speculation, it's impossible to know, but it's not olum keminhago noheg. It's not olum keminhago noheg. The one island, the one oasis of stability during all this cosmic upheaval was the United States. And to be candid, foolishly, naively, we probably felt very secure that it couldn't happen here, couldn't happen here. I'm neither a political analyst nor am I talking politics. But religiously, one has to recognize that as of Tuesday night, as of Wednesday morning, that same upheaval which is turning the world order upside down of the past 30 years finally overtook the United States also. With all the postmortems and all the analysis and all the natural causes and the analysis can be insightful and all the Monday morning quarterbacking can be true, but it defied no one could have imagined it, no one could have imagined. If one wanted to design a campaign that was guaranteed to fail, so that's the campaign which would have been designed. If there were revelations that could ever bring someone down, it defies with and its potential is unknown. I obviously don't claim to know where we're headed. More importantly, more significantly, it's not necessarily the case that there's only one path, albeit unknown to us in front of us. Yitachen that there are two or more possible paths. The Rav has a remarkable, remarkable teaching into the potential of historical development. How do we reconcile the foreshadowing of history that we find in the Torah with bechirah? How can it be that the future course of history is foreshadowed, whether it's Yitzchok Avinu digging beiros or so much of the מעשה אבות סימן לבנים, all of the maaseh, not so much, all of the מעשה אבות סימן לבנים? So how does one reconcile that with a belief in bechirah? Doesn't that seem to indicate that everything is everything that the script has already been written? So the Rav provides kedarko an extraordinary, extraordinary insight. Says we know the Bas Kol as recorded in Maseches Eruvin tells us that in interpreting a Pasuk in Chumash, in saying a Svara, there's a notion of אלו ואלו דברי אלוקים חיים. When Hakadosh Baruch Hu gave us the Torah, when he dictated to Moshe Rabbeinu the words of the Torah, so Hakadosh Baruch Hu left some things open amongst the Chachmei Hamesorah, amongst those who would know everything that was unequivocally revealed within Torah, left open the possibility of different, differing interpretations which are equally valid and equally true אלו ואלו דברי אלוקים חיים. Says the Rav, the same thing is true about predictions, about foreshadowing in history. It also admits of multiple interpretations and that's where our Bechira comes into play and that's where Hakadosh Baruch Hu leaves room for our Bechira. The example that he gives is the Akeidah could have happened in either of two ways. It was, it was a given that there was gonna be a sacrifice. It was a given that Avraham Avinu was gonna sacrifice Yitzchak but אלו ואלו דברי אלוקים חיים, it could have happened in one way, it did happen in a different way. It could have happened with a physical sacrifice. Had Avraham Avinu resisted, it could have ended ultimately with his having to go through with a physical Akeidah. When Avraham Avinu immediately demonstrated his willingness to comply with the Tzivui Hashem, thereby sacrificing his love for Yitzchak Avinu, sacrificing that love for Yitzchak Avinu and giving it to Hakadosh Baruch Hu, so that was a Kiyum in the Akeidah. That was one of the interpretations to which it was open, of which it admitted. So even when one senses a watershed moment, the ground shifting underneath, it's not only that we don't know what the path in front of us is, we don't know the multiplicity of paths, but there's not only one path in front of us. There's an אלו ואלו דברי אלוקים חיים in terms of the paths in front of us. L'mai Nafka Mina? Fair question. L'mai Nafka Mina? Eisav comes into to Yitzchak Avinu. יקם אבי ויאכל מציד בנו. So the Torah describes, the Torah records ויחרד יצחק חרדה גדולה עד מאד. Yitzchak is seized by, trembles, he's shaking. What's Yitzchak shaking? Yitzchak realizes that the very course of history which he thought he was charting in one way by imparting the beracha to Esav, he realizes that there's an inscrutable chochma and an overwhelming gevura that's uprooting and rerouting the course of history. And when a person sees such a moment, the entire course of history was changed by that. And Yitzchak Avinu recognizes that. He realizes right away that overwhelming display and expression of inscrutable chochma and gevura fills a person with a sense of awe. And as the Rambam writes in a different context, and a person recognizes that he is a בריה שפלה ואפלה עומדת בדעת קלה לפני תמים דעות. That that's the reaction one should have and at such a moment. The other nafka mina lich'ora, when the entire world order is potentially in flux and the upheaval is no longer just in Asia, no longer just in the Middle East, but potentially on these shores, the world's only superpower, so the natural and correct reaction is to hold on more tightly and more tenaciously to the anchor of Torah mitzvos. To try to learn with a little bit more hasmada, to try to davven and say berachos with a little bit more kavana, to try to be more medakdek be-mitzvos, try to be more makpid on bein adam l'chaveiro.