Rabbi Tzvi Yehuda Kook, of Blessed memory celebrated Yom Haatzmaut with great passion and excitement. Besides discussing the events of the current times, he would speak every year about the chapter of Psalms that corresponded to the number of the anniversary of Israel of that specific year.

Based on this it would be proper to look towards Psalm 75 to look for some inspiration for this year’s celebration. One only needs to look to the second verse of the chapter:

“To you, O God, we give thanks, to you we give thanks; men declare your wondrous works”.

This verse teaches us two main points.

First, we must give thanks. All too often we go through life without recognizing the blessings that we have. This is true not only on a personal level but on a national one as well. It is easy to see everything that occurs in Israel as a natural occurrence but especially on Yom Haatzmaut we nmust do our utmost to see each thing that happens, small as it may be as an act of God. We must constantly turn to God in thanks and recognize that we live in miraculous times.

While recognizing that all is from God, we must also remember that He expects us to do our share and not overly rely on miracles. While we acknowledge that there is much to celebrate about our beloved Israel we all recognize that there is still much work to do in order to make Israel into the place that it truly can be.

The second thing that this verse teaches is that we must proclaim to all that Hashem does wondrous works. We mustn’t keep the lovely treasures that Judaism and Israel offers to ourselves, but we must do our best to proclaim them to the whole world. We must make demonstrate the Torah’s relevancy to living in the modern world so that all will want to partake in it. 

There are now 100 Barkai rabbis that are selflessly working in communities all throughout Israel. They are fulfilling their role in bringing the joys of Judaism and the blessings of Israel to tens of thousands of Jews. They are supportive and loving especially during these turbulent times and are using the tools they have learned at Barkai to make their communities the kind of place that people feel proud to live in.

In the articles below you will discover some of the ways in which Barkai is carrying out its mission of creating a better Israel.

As we celebrate a very important Yom Haatzmaut on behalf of all the rabbis, rabbaniot and staff of Barkai we wish you Moadim Lesimcha Le’Geulah Shelemah – Happy Holiday; to a complete redemption.