Purim and Tikkun (Healing)

In a shiur on Purim, Rabbi Green of Birkat HaTorah discusses the connection between feeling Hashem's unconditional love and Purim. In the story of Purim, because of Haman's decree it was the most dangerous time for Jews. Thank G-d we had the merit of our righteous tzaddikim Mordechai and Esther to guide us, because it does not seem that we merited our survival without them.

We see again and again how much Hashem loves us unconditionally and allows us to continue on to serve him despite the fact that we blatantly ignore his laws and disregard his providence. In his shiur, Rabbi Green illuminates the fact that the relationship is 2 sided - just as Hashem loves us unconditionally we need to reciprocate, and forgive Hashem for times where we felt deeply wronged because we could not see the whole picture. If we don't, the repercussions are much more devastating than the temporary wounds.... causing a permanent severance in our relationship and connection with Hashem.

Where to start the repair? First recognizing this wounded place inside of us...second undoing old negative beliefs.. and finally letting go and forgiving Hasem. We spoke in a previous post that Emunah is connected with simcha. How are we ever supposed to have simcha and emunah if somewhere deep down we are harboring anger at Hashem?

I have witnessed that many Jews are angry at Hashem and have some subconscious erroneous belief that Hashem does not fully love them and the Jewish people.

Where does this come from? Perhaps this is a remnant of our dark history that became part of our collective unconscious (Purim, Inquisition, Holocaust). The specific root is not so important. What is important is that some part of the Jewish Neshama inside all of us needs to be healed. Otherwise this negative dark hole of pain mixed with lack of emunah from our collective past will attract similar negative beliefs from our personal traumas. Any feelings of anger, terror, betrayal we felt in our lives can easily be filed with the same heading: "Hashem does not really love us (me and the Jewish people)". This causes us to disconnect ourselves from Hashem even further and the cycle continues.

How to break the cycle? This takes continual inner work. Awareness being the first step. We should be strengthened by knowing that this is the work of all of Am Yisrael and that we are not doing it alone. The rewards are so great, for when we forgive and let Hashem back in we can have more love for ourselves, G-d and the Jewish people. This is a crucial part of bringing Moschiach consciousness, which is the consciousness of Purim. May we merit to do this work easily.

*Check out healing links for guides to inner work