{"id":79079,"date":"2020-08-20T16:31:33","date_gmt":"2020-08-20T13:31:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=79079"},"modified":"2020-08-20T16:31:33","modified_gmt":"2020-08-20T13:31:33","slug":"the-beginning-of-the-end-what-filled-the-void-of-prophecy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/the-beginning-of-the-end-what-filled-the-void-of-prophecy\/","title":{"rendered":"The Beginning Of The End: What Filled The Void Of Prophecy?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"entry-content\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[],"acf":{"old_id":"79079","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":46656,"related_cahpter":"551","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"Study and prayer, and a new beginning","content":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Our sages understand one of the opening phrases of Zechariah, \u201cAnd as for the prophets, could they live forever (1:5)?\u201d to be a subtle message about the impending cessation of prophecy. The Talmud tells us that with the death of Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi the spirit of prophecy departed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What changed for the Jewish nation, and what filled the void of prophecy?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One significant alteration in the Jewish reality was the removal of the persistent pull of idolatry during the Second Temple era. The 12<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">th<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> century mystic R. Yehuda HaHasid explained prophecy as a counterbalance to idolatry. In the spirit of that understanding, but from the opposite direction, R. Eliyahu Dessler, in <\/span><em><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Michtav m\u2019Eliyahu<\/span><\/em><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, suggested that once the urge for idolatry declined, prophecy would have too much power if left unchecked.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">During the period of prophecy, the Jewish people were privileged to be the beneficiaries of open miracles \u2013 those acts of God that were unequivocally, well\u2026acts of God! From the day the sun stood still (Joshua 10:12) to the miracle of oil during the Second Temple era, open miracles abounded. But as the era of prophecy waned, so too did the occurrence of such open miracles. With the diminishing capacity of prophecy to guide the people and the loss of the abundance of open miracles to influence them, an opportunity to mature into a closer relationship with God on their own accord was presented.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Perhaps, then, it is no coincidence that the end of the Second Temple era and the cessation of prophecy heralded the beginning of the codification of the Oral Law. According to R. Zadok HaKohen of Lublin (Sefer Olam Rabbah 30), <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">the development of the Oral Law would have been impossible had the people continued to turn to the prophets for knowledge of God\u2019s will.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As well as the shifting paradigm of religious expression from prophecy to the study and understanding of the Oral Law, Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, in <\/span><em><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Lonely Man of Faith<\/span><\/em><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, saw the decline of prophecy as the catalyst to the rise of prayer. Prayer, says Soloveitchik, was the new realization of the Jewish people\u2019s conversation with God. \u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If God had stopped calling man, they urged, let man call God. And so, the covenantal colloquy was shifted from the level of prophecy to that of prayer.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One version of the ideal state, we are taught, will entail a combination of our reasoned, deliberate connection to God, with<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> the revival of prophecy and open miracles in the Messianic era.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","image":{"ID":51741,"id":51741,"title":"dt27-two-torahs","filename":"dt27-two-torahs.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt27-two-torahs.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/two-types-of-torah\/dt27-two-torahs\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"dt27-two-torahs","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":51733,"date":"2019-03-20 11:36:43","modified":"2022-09-05 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