Welcome back!  We explore Rav Kook’s description of the Birthpangs of Moshiach – we’re right in the middle of it (hopefully closer to the end).  Knowing what is happening allows us to stay afloat in such difficult times.  Rav Kook’s prescription for how to manage is quite surprising.

This essay deals with the attempt to manifest the supernal reality of the Jewish nation into a body, and its struggles.  This particular session also deals with the question of when and how Mashiach will come.  Please note these segments are not in chronological order.

We have to go back and look at our weak spots so that when we get ready to embrace a new ideology or system or relationship of state of being, we can anticipate what about it we might be attracted to, and then we can know if we are perhaps falling for it again.

Yes, every belief system has some common ground with Judaism and Torah.  But we need to rigorously figure out what that relationship is – and throw away the excess

Torah is expanding as the world turns.  New ideologies emerge in the world, and it is our work to explore and understand how they interact with Torah.  Because they do interact – Torah is infinite and therefore there is no ideology to which Torah does not relate

We need Torah that speaks to now.  So we have to know what ‘now’ is.  This essay speaks about the necessity of not rejecting the world we live in, but instead using it as a means and motive to understand the Torah we were given.

The Mitzvot take on certain meanings at certain points in time in order to guide us toward an ultimate end, but they also shed those meanings in favor of other meanings.  This can also happen in our personal lives, where a certain passage, prayer or mitzvah can hold meaning for us but must at some [...]