This week’s Haftorah is the last passage in Amos. It ends with these words:
Behold – days are coming – the words of Hashem – when the plower will encounter the reaper, and he who treads upon the grapes will meet the one who brings the seeds; the mountains will drip with wine and the hills will melt. I shall bring back the captivity of My people Israel, and they will rebuild desolate cities; they will return and plant vineyards and drink wine; they will make gardens and eat their fruit. I shall implant them upon their Land; they will not be uprooted again from upon their Land that I have given them, says Hashem, your God.
Jack the city-dweller came to the country to watch his cousin, Farmer Joe working:
They came to a beautiful field of grass. Joe destroyed all the grass and turned the dirt over. Jack was shocked. Joe then took a nice bundle of wheat, scattered it all over the field and went home. Jack went back to the city, perplexed.
A while later, Jack came back. The field was full of wheat. “Ah, I see” he said. Joe then cut down all the wheat, and scattered it in the wind. “Stop!” cried Jack. Joe, ignoring Jack, took the leftover bits from the wheat and began crushing them up. Jack was left speechless. Joe then took the powder he had, mixed it with some water into a clayish paste and went to fire up his oven. He then took the clay (which had grown) and cast it into the flaming oven. “All that work, and you’re just going to burn it?!” screamed Jack, who couldn’t understand.
An hour later, Joe pulled out fresh bread from the oven and Jack finally understood. (From the Palace Gates Haggadah I think, quoting the Maggid of __ )
Much of Jewish history is very hard to understand, but in the end “the plower will encounter the reaper, and he who treads upon the grapes will meet the one who brings the seeds” and we will understand. The days are coming, after 2000 years, when the cities are being rebuilt, the gardens are being planted, the People have returned to their land where “they will not be uprooted from again.”
