A few hours ago, I returned from Israel. We had the great merit of being in Jerusalem for several weeks, celebrating the wedding of two of our dear children. Besides the great happiness that we had as parents, we also enjoyed being in our beloved land, Israel, and more specifically in Jerusalem, Yerushalayim ‘ir haQodesh.

Israel is a land of miracles. Not only miracles of the past, in the days of our Kings and Prophets. Israel is a country where you also experience miracles today .”Identifying” a miracle is not easy .. it is easier to recognize a miracle when it already happened, than while it is actually happening to you. Our Sages said that “whoever experiences a miracle, can not identify it” (אין בעל הנס מכיר בניסו). There is a psychological barrier that says, “If it is happening to me, here and now, and I see it and I live it, it cannot  be a miracle.” In the next lines we will try to overcome this barrier.

וישבתם לטח בארצכם

To begin with, the feeling of “security” that I felt in Israel, I did not feel it anywhere else in the world. Nor in the safest neighborhoods in New York, let alone in South America.

At night you can walk in the streets of Yerushalayim, and  you do not feel insecure. The opposite, the Mamila shopping center or the old train station, which now is an area of luxurious  restaurants, at 11 or 12 at night, is full of people, mostly families with their children and grandchildren, enjoying peacefully the cool summer breeze of Jerusalem.

In Jerusalem, and throughout Israel, one sees many people with guns. Probably in no city in the world you would see so many men, especially civilians, carrying weapons. And yet, I did not feel fear. On the contrary, I felt more secure.  Because I trust the hands that hold these weapons. I can not imagine not having a panic attack at the sight of armed civilians walking freely in any other country in the world …

Personally, what surprises me most, is to see during the day very young children walking by themselves, very calmly and without fear. I have often seen a 6 or 7 years old child walking, or going up or down the bus, taking care of his or her little 4 or 5 years old brother or sister. I have lived in many countries and I never saw anything like it!

The most miraculous part of all this, is that this exceptional sense of security occurs ironically in the only country in the world whose existence is openly threatened. Israel is, literally, in the center of the Middle East, in the middle of the world’s most dangerous battlefield. Where every day hundreds, or thousands, of people are brutally murdered.

This sense of security is experienced in a country where our neighbors are our enemies … I remember in my first visit to Israel, our guide pointed to a construction site where all workers were Arabs. And he said, “When it comes to Israel, if you do not believe in miracles, you are not realistic.  And here’s the proof: the same hands that want to destroy Israel, are building it”.

וקבצתי אתכם מכל העמים

And then, the most important part of Yerushalayim. The Kotel HaMa’arabí, the Western Wall. I like to  pray at the Kotel on Friday night. Why the Kotel? Our rabbis said that although we no longer have the Bet haMiqdash, the Shekhina, a miraculous reflection of the Divine presence, still resides at the Kotel. Praying at the Kotel is praying as close as possible to HaShem. The closest to His dwelling pace. Experiencing in our souls an echo of His presence.

And what is special about praying at the Kotel on Friday night? Friday night you can experience the other miraculous dimension of the Kotel, the human dimension. Let me explain: we Jews, are unfortunately very divided: religious, non-religious; Sephardim, Ashkenazim; Hasidim, Mitnagdim; army, no army; 45% of Jews live in Israel, 55% outside of Israel; There are Yemenite Jews, Ethiopian, Russian, South American; They are Americans and there are the French jews (more present than ever). We are so different from each other. And usually you see the Hassidim with the Hassidim; soldiers with other soldiers; and the French with the French. Except on a Friday night at the Western Wall.  When I finish my Tefila, I like looking at the Kotel from the balcony, and observe what is probably the biggest miracle of our times. Witness, with my privileged eyes what our prophets were able to visualize only in their most optimistic prophecies: the gathering of the exiles (qibbuts galuyot); the end of 20 centuries of separation and division that our people suffered in the diaspora. Because every Friday night at the Kotel you see literally all the people of Israel represented in this special place. All together, with one and same feeling in the heart, עם אחד בלב אחד. An incredible human rainbow where Yehudim of all colors and backgrounds pray, sing and dance “together.” And nothing and no one separates them. I know of no other place in the world, or any other time, where you can witness such a miracle. Where you can recognize this incredible miracle that easily.

May HaShem allow us to continue enjoying many years of peace, security and unity in Eretz Israel. And all of us, who are still living in our voluntary exile, may we all merit to live very soon our final redemption, בב”א

Rabbi Shemuel ben Moshe de Medina (abbreviated רשד”ם) was a great Talmudist and the Rosh Yeshiba of the Talmudic academy of that city. His teachers were the famous rabbi Yosef Taitatsaq, who was also one of the teachers of rabbi Yosef Caro, and Rabbi Levi Ibn Habib. These two rabbis were very different in their orientation and intellectual horizons. Both were great luminaries, but while Rabbi ibn Habib was inclined to reason and Talmudic logic, rabbi Taitatsaq was more inclined to mysticism and qabbala. Rabbi Medina absorb from these two rabbis, but ironically, he did not dedicate himself nor to philosophy not to mysticism, virtually all of his teachings and writings focus on Jewish Law (Halakha).

He lived thorough many personal misfortunes. Rabbi Medina lost his father at a very young age. Then,  his two sons in law, rabbi Yosef Tsarfati and rabbi Ytshaq Hayoun, died at a young age living behind their wives, the only two daughters of rabbi Medina and numerous children. A few years later, his brother, a man of means who educated him and supported him financially, also passed away.  And the burden of the maintenance of his widowed and her children also fell upon him. Still, he did not abandon the study of Tora and continued writing and teaching. In all this time, he never wanted to be paid from the public community funds, even though he was in a great need of money. On the contrary, as a testimony of his great humbleness, he paid his communal taxes, from which he was technically exempted as a Tora scholar, to avoid presumption ( כדי לא להחזיק עצמו כתלמיד חכם) and  benefitting from his Tora.

Rabbi Medina founded a Yeshiva in Salonica in which he introduced the system of teaching of the great Spanish talmudic scholars from the time of Isaac Campanton. This Yeshiba was supported by the famous Jewish philanthropist Doña Gracia Mendes Nasí. He had many disciples, among them rabbi Abraham di Boton, author of lehem Mishne.

Rabbi Medina was the accepted Halakhic authority both in his own and in the following generations in Salonica and beyond. Numberless questions were addressed to him from all parts of the Ottoman Empire and Italy. Rabbi Ḥayim Shabbetai said of him: “He was an expert judge of encyclopedic knowledge, and one must not deviate an iota from his decisions”. The Halakhic decisions of rabbi Medina were studied an incorporated also among Eastern European Tora scholars in later generations, and his rulings are often quoted in modern times by judges in the State of Israel in support of their decisions.

Rabbi Medina was one of the leaders of the congregations coming from the “Gerush” (the expulsion from Spain and Portugal). Rabbi Medina himself was of Portuguese origin and he acted as the rabbi of the Portuguese Synagogue in Salonica. Still, when a controversy aroused on the subject of liturgy (Jewish prayers), and the congregations wanted to print their own Siddurim, rabbi Medina decided to print the version of the Spanish Jews (sefaradim), and not the Portuguese, based on the merits of that version, which was in his own words, “flawless and accessible to all”.

In one of the controversies which took place in Salonica and elsewhere, Rabbi Medina maintained the right of the wealthy members and contributors of the community to regulate the direction of communal affairs. According to him, as had been the custom in Spain, the leadership of the community should be in the hands of those who bear its financial burden, providing they were loyal to the religious principles.

He died at Salonica in 1589. His son was rabbi Moshe De Medina, who was a very important rabbi and a successful merchant and philanthropist, helped to found a new Hebrew printer where many important Tora manuscripts were published for the first time thanks to his generous efforts. Among them, of course, the book of his father Pisqe Rabbi Shemuel De Medina ( שו”ת מהרשד”ם).  This book contains a total of 956 questions and answers on all areas of Jewish law, with an introduction by his own son, Rabbi Moshe.

You can download the book of Rabbi Shemuel De Medina,  published in Luvov 1860, clicking here.