1.
Yes, I know. The Ronen Bar controversy is nipping at our heels, the pope who accused us of genocide has departed the world, the Gaza campaign has dragged on for a year and a half, Iran is deceiving the world, economic challenges are mounting, societal divisions are deepening, and the world feels like a boiling pot. And yet, we are now in a unique time on the Hebrew calendar, between Holocaust Remembrance Day and Independence Day, ten national days of gratitude in which we must rise above the crumpled immediacy of our lives and breathe in the air of historical summits.
For if our mouths were filled with song like the sea, and our tongues with joy like its roaring waves, our lips with praise as vast as the sky, our eyes shining like the sun and moon, our arms spread like the wings of eagles, and our feet as swift as deer, we still could not give thanks enough for the miracle of our resurrection in our land after 2,000 years. From this vantage point, today's storms fall into proper proportion.
2.
For thousands of years, our people yearned for the Messiah. "I believe with complete faith in the coming of the Messiah, and even though he may tarry, I will wait for him every day." Jews repeated this core tenet in every valley of sorrow to which they were exiled. The belief in our national redemption, as prophesied by our prophets, is the root of Jewish optimism. It's no accident that our national anthem is called "The Hope."
But the Messiah was never necessarily a single person, a savior leading us home in tears and joy. In the Bible, the Messiah was not a religious figure but a national leader anointed to rule (In Hebrew the word messiah means anointed). King David called Saul "the Lord's anointed" (1Samuel 24:6). Our sages in the Talmud taught: "Rabbi Shmuel said: There is no difference between this world and the days of the Messiah, except the end of political subjugation" (Sanhedrin 99a). Shmuel, a visionary with deep historical and theological insight, lived in the wake of the failed Bar Kokhba Revolt, which deepened the exile under Roman rule.
The 12th-century Jewish philosopher and legal scholar Maimonides codified this view in his seminal legal work Mishneh Torah, specifically in the section "Laws of Kings and Their Wars", that is, the laws of statehood. This is the foundation upon which the promises of our prophets will be fulfilled. But first and foremost: a sovereign state.
When I served as an ambassador, I was often asked why, in my view, the Holocaust happened, and why the Jews of Italy were expelled. My initial answer was simple: "Because our enemies could." At the time, the Jewish people had no national home or defense. After every pogrom in exile, what could we do the next day? Typically, flee or hide. In contrast, after the horrors of October 7, we rose from the ashes and fought for our survival, not merely to defend ourselves but to destroy our enemies. This is a living illustration of Shmuel's teaching.
3.
For over a thousand years, since the time of the Geonim, Jews have studied the connection between Passover and other Jewish holidays through the mnemonic At-Ba-Sh (A type of linguistic cipher in which the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet is replaced with the last letter, the second letter with the penultimate letter, and so on). This links the first day of Passover (Aleph) with the 9th of Av (Tav for Tisha BeAv), the second (Bet) with Shavuot (Shin), and so on. The seventh day of Passover was long seen as having no parallel. In 1881, the Gerrer Rebbe wrote in his work Sfat Emet: "From Passover we hope for another [holiday], as it is written: 'As in the days when you came out of Egypt, I will show you wonders' (Micah 7:15)."
On May 14, 1948, the 5th of Iyar 5708, we received the answer. The seventh day of Passover corresponds exactly with Israeli Independence Day. The British Mandate officially ended on May 15, but to avoid violating the Sabbath, Israel's leaders declared independence on Friday afternoon, the 5th of Iyar. Today, we still shift our celebrations to avoid Sabbath desecration, but the 5th of Iyar always falls on the same day of the week as the seventh day of Passover, in which the sea split before us.
4.
Friday at twilight is when the ordinary meets the holy, when the weekdays blend into Shabbat. Our sages taught in Pirkei Avot (Chapters of the Fathers) that ten wonders were created in this liminal moment, like the earth's mouth that swallowed Korach, the talking donkey of Balaam, and the manna, the Tablets, the rainbow, and more. The Mishnah adds: "Some say even the original tongs were created then," answering how the first metal tool was made, since tongs are needed to forge tongs, the first pair must have been made by God.
Unlike Greek mythology, in which Prometheus steals fire for mankind, Judaism teaches that God granted technology and creation directly to humanity.
5.
In the second volume of The Seventh Column, poet Nathan Alterman titled one chapter "The First Tongs," likening the Jewish state to a divine act of creation, describing Israel's birth from the fires of war.
That column was published on the day of the Declaration of Independence, the very day of wonders, Friday, the 5th of Iyar 5708, amid rumors that if the state were to be declared, Arab armies would invade in an attempt to destroy it. Drawing on the tradition of Israel's prophets, Alterman encouraged the people and fortified their spirit for the historic challenge.
The newborn state was fragile, he wrote, but it was carried by generations: "For the ancient people upon whom she hovers / Will not let her fall, bleeding, at her feet./ Before the drawn sword of Arabs mercenaries/ All the generations of Israel will be drawn from their sheaths." He concluded with words of enduring faith: "And if Egypt marches its troops,/ and Ammon blasts its horns… we shall know:/ From this day on, the living state will fight for its life…/ and blessed is He who has brought His people thus far."
6.
These words resonate in our time, as our nation fights for its survival on multiple fronts. In every personal or national crisis, it is vital to remember where we stood only eighty years ago, a historical blink, and where we are today. Despite the hardships we face, earlier generations would have longed to live in our era, in these "days of the Messiah," when we dwell in a sovereign Jewish state free from foreign rule.
We are merely one link in a long generational chain. Every generation contributes to the towering intellectual and textual legacy of our people, and each sacrifices for the survival of the nation and its eternal ideas. Now it is our turn.
And blessed is He who has brought His people thus far. Happy Independence Day.
