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Glorified murder - on Purim

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Rabbi Elchanan Lewis

25 Adar 5767
Question
We Jews are usually not allowed to kill, and we don’t glorify murder. Why then do we make a big deal on Purim that we killed 75,000 people on Yud Gimmel Adar? It is against our nature to celebrate the Massacre of people. Don’t Chazal say (not sure of the exact wording) that when your enemies fall, you shoudn’t be happy?
Answer
We don’t make a big deal of killing 75,000 of the worst of our enemies, those who tried to wipe us out in a cleverly planned evil final solution. We don’t make a big deal, even if all we did is defend ourselves from the pogrom by standing for our lives and the lives of our little children and wives who were attacked (Ester 9 16). We do make a big deal of the miracle of our salvation, against all odds. Of the fact that Hashem despite our deeds didn’t let us down when we cried out to him. We would have been happier if we didn’t have to go to war, to hold the sword and to fight back against our cruel and wicked enemy, we would have been much happier if we could sit and learn the Torah and worship Hashem, but we didn’t merit that, in any case that is not something to be ashamed of, they should be ashamed for their evil plot. Maybe that is another lesson we can learn from the Purim story.
את המידע הדפסתי באמצעות אתר yeshiva.org.il