"You shall eat and you will be satisfied and you will bless HaShem your G-d for the good land that He gave you."


Rabbi Yosi asks in the holy Zohar: "You shall eat and be satisfied and will bless HaShem for the good land He gave you." If you are in the Land of Israel,you bless after eating, for it says, "for the good land that He gave you," but outside the land, in the exile, we don’t need to bless after eating, for it is certainly not "the good land that He gave you."


One possible solution could have been found in the blessing we say after partaking of fruit. For example, olives - when we bless after eating olives we say on "the" fruits, but if they are olives from the Land of Israel we say on "your" fruits. We could have, then, when eating outside the Land of Israel, in the exile, left out the parts that talk about "the good land which You gave us." Why, then, is this not the case, and even those Jews who unfortunately live outside the Land still bless the same way that the Jews in the Land of Israel bless, saying "for the good land that He gave you"?

Can one just imagine what greatness awaits the world when the Holy Temple will be rebuilt?



The holy Zohar continues: When G-d created the world, He divided it into many parts. One of the parts was for man to live in, and even that was subdivided for the 70 nations, but all of their sustenance comes from one small point, that being the Land of Israel, which is in the center of the world. And inside the Land, its holiness is drawn from Jerusalem, and Jerusalem draws its spiritual powers from the Holy Temple, from the Holy of Holies. All the sustenance which the world derives comes from the Temple site in Jerusalem. All goodness in this world with which the nations sustain themselves - all comes from the Holy Temple in Jerusalem.


The Zohar goes on to teach us that all of this sustenance, which is spread out to the world in the merit of the Temple, continues even when the Temple is in ruins. Can one just imagine what greatness, then, awaits the world when the Holy Temple will be rebuilt? The midrash teaches us that if the nations of the world would only have known of the blessings bestowed on the world because of the Temple, they would have sent their greatest armies to protect it.


So, the Zohar concludes that even the Jews who are still living outside the Land of Israel must bless after they eat using the words "for the good land that He gave you," for in essence, even though they are not in the Land, the blessings are coming from here. It is in the merit of the Land of Israel that the world continues to exist.


Similarly, we find the prophet Haggai calling the people to rebuild the Temple in his day, as the text tells us: "Thus said HaShem, Master of Legions: 'This nation has said, the time has not yet come, but I say it is time for the Temple of HaShem to be rebuilt.'"


Now, one might think that Haggai would be telling the people all about the spiritual benefits ensuing from rebuilding the Temple. This, though, is far from the case. In fact, the prophet talks only about the material benefits one gets when the Temple is built: "Without the Temple, you sow much but bring in little to eat, you eat without being satisfied, you drink without quenching your thirst, you dress yet no one is warm, and all who earn money earn it for a purse with a hole. Because of My Temple, which is in ruins while each of you dwells in his own house, therefore the heavens withhold their dew and the Land withholds its produce." In other words, without the Temple, there is no blessing, not in the Land of Israel and certainly not outside the Land.


Want to have the market hit the roof? Want not to have to worry about the bank calling you over that bounced check? Then get the Temple rebuilt - the source for all blessings in this world. Maybe, just maybe, when you put it in terms of dollars and cents and the fiscal benefits that will be coming when G-d's House will be rebuilt, then people will finally wake up to want to build the House of HaShem. I, for one, cannot wait.