I wrote most of this article last week, but was waiting for the right moment to put it up here on the blog.

BH, after transliterating that prayer from the Rav to sleep well yesterday, I had the best night’s sleep I had in a longgggg time….

Both my kids moved back home now, and are doing their best to manage the every-day stresses with emuna and staying productive.

I haven’t checked the little bit of news I engage with yet, so I have no idea ‘what the story’ is meant to be today, but at least in my world, I am planning on having more of a ‘stay-cation’ today, baking something yummy, doing some pilates at home, practising my guitar….

Life is too short, way too short, to stay stuck in fearful ‘stress mode’ all day long.

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So, this what I wrote last week, when I suddenly remembered about the Pidyon Kollel, and how in the past, it has worked like a charm, spiritually, to help get Am Yisrael out of wars and intifadas.

And then this AM, someone sent me another piece of info from Likutei Halachot, that is another piece of the puzzle, which I’ll put up below the piece.

Read on.

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I thought I’d put up some more stuff from the OIAG books where the Rav talked about how doing a ‘communal pidyon’ could sweeten things like intifadas and wars – in the past.

I say ‘in the past’, because the courts in Israel have forbidden the Rav from talking about money in any way, shape or form.

But, we see this worked before, and there is no reason at all why it shouldn’t still be working now – he’s still the one in a generation, the concept of doing pidyonot to cancel harsh decrees is still sound. Tachlis, nothing has changed except the Rav is now forbidden by court order from spelling any of this stuff out, or talking about doing pidyonot, or directly taking any money, which now goes straight to the Shuvu Banim organisations.

Or to put it another way – the test of faith has gone up a level.

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Anyway, this stuff has been in print for a few years, it’s not new, but it’s more relevant than ever:

This is from page 148 of OIAG Vol. 2, and it’s talking about the start of the so-called ‘Stabbing Intifada’:

A little before Purim 5755, Rav Berland issued a call for every member of Am Yisrael to contribute a sum of money, however small, toward a communal “pidyon hakollel” that would sweeten the harsh decrees of the so-called Third Intifada that the Rav could see looming on the horizon.

The goal was to raise $600,000 — a dollar for each of the root souls of the nation of Israel — and to sweeten the judgments that way.

At that time, he sent out a message saying: “We are in a new intifada, and it’s a terrible intifada that will spread around the globe. It’s impossible to stop it [by natural means].”

Unfortunately, even though the request to participate in the “pidyon hakollel” was repeated many times, with announcements appearing in many of the Breslov yeshivos encouraging people to donate, and many people took the Rav’s plea to heart, most of these people were not wealthy, and barely a sixth of the total required was raised.

Then the Festival of Sukkos 5776 arrived, and with it came the beginning of the prophesized upswing in Arab violence.

When the shootings, stabbings and other attacks began in earnest in Eretz Yisrael, everyone saw that the prophecy of the Rav had indeed materialized. The Third Intifada, foreseen by the Rav and which he’d hoped to avoid and sweeten, had begun.

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It’s important to note that even with Shuvu Banim ten years ago, people were not taking a lot of what the Rav was saying seriously.

So, when the Rav asked for the pidyon hakollel to be raised, $600,000, to prevent the ‘stabbing intifada’ from beginning – many people didn’t heed the call. That’s human nature. What happened next is – the intifada began exactly as predicted, and very quickly, a lot of people woke up.

Here’s what happened next:

At this time, the Rav publicized an important message that whoever would donate 98 shekels a month for a pidyon would be saved, in that merit, along with his whole family, from the terrorist attacks.

The Rav promised this himself, in the following words where he said:

“As long as the intifada continues, everyone is obligated to give, every Jew in every place of the world. Even non-Jews should give 98 shekels — which is $26, or €25, every month, for as long as this continues.

In every place in the world there are terror attacks. Whoever wants to be saved from this new intifada that is spreading over the entire globe, needs to give. Everyone who gives the pidyon will be saved from all attacks, and from all stumbling blocks, and from all types of sin.”

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Ad kan, from OIAG – written and published back in 2017.

Here is a brief explanation of how these pidyonot work, spiritually, to sweeten harsh judgements, found a little further down the page:

WHY PIDYON NEFESH WORKS TO REMOVE HARSH JUDGMENTS 

The language that Chazal use to describe “money” is damim, which literally means “blood” or “bloods” in Hebrew. When there are harsh decrees hanging over Am Yisrael, they can only be sweetened by immense amounts of mesirus nefesh, or self-sacrifice from the Jewish people, which often entails the spilling of blood.

But there is another way of sweetening the decrees.

Instead of spilling real blood, God forbid, it’s also possible to fulfill the requirement to “spill blood” by the self-sacrifice required in giving money, or damim. If you give whatever amount you’re able to give, with mesirus nefesh, then you fulfill the verse that states, “Charity saves from death¹.”

A pidyon nefesh where each person gives a fixed amount is called pidyon hakollel, or “communal redemption,” and this sweetens all of the judgments that are currently hanging over the nation of Israel, which means we won’t see any more blood spilled in our country.

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Again, this stuff is ‘old’ – it was said by the Rav a decade ago, before the courts here banned him from speaking about money or raising pidyonot.

Today, there is not going to be a direct call to raise $600k as a pidyon kollel, to get the rockets, or whatever they really are, to stop.

Today – each person has to do some hitbodedut, and ask God to show them what is true, and what is not.

And then, if their heart moves them to try to participate in this, they should hop over to the RavBerland.com site, and go HERE.

Pick something that talks to you – and give something, with the intention of it being a pidyon kollel, for Am Yisrael.

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Me personally, I am a huge believer in intention being the main thing, with this tzedaka.

Not everyone holds that way, and that’s OK. This is what I believe, based on my own experiences and my own hitbodedut.

Right now, we can’t do pidyonot the way we used to in the past, because of the court orders. So, we have to garner our clues wherever we find them. When the Rav says giving to such and such a place is akin to giving tzedaka straight into my hands – me personally, I take that at face value.

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Now, this is what someone just sent me over email, I think from one of the Hebrew language Shuvu Banim whatsapp groups:

Hebrew first:

*ליקוטי הלכות הלכות השכמת הבוקר הלכה א’.*

*מבאר שהגאולה אחרונה תלויה בזה שיקומו בחצות ורבי נתן מפרט שני סוגי אנשים- ״הכשרים״, ״והיראים״. כלומר הכשרים זה אלו שקמים חצות בשביל לערוך תיקון חצות ללמוד ולהתפלל.*

*״והיראים״ דהיינו סוג אחר, שקמים חצות בגלל יראה שיראים מהטילים אז קמים בגלל האזעקות בכדי לקום למקלטים.*

*ובזה אפשר להבין אולי טיפה מה שהרב מתכוון שהרב אומר כבר תקופה את זמן חצות, וכבר כמה ימים איך שחמינאי מנסה להעיר את כולם בחצות, ועכשיו גם טראמפ ולכן גם קרא למבצע שלו ״חצות״*

*שבמבט ראשון זה נשמע שהרב עושה בדיחה אבל על פי המבואר כאן מובן שזה ממש הכוונה של הטילים והמלחמה, שכולם יקומו חצות אף אם זה רק מחמת יראה שבזה תלויה הגאולה האחרונה!!*

*הפלא ופלא ודו״ק*

*נכתב ע”י תלמידי הרב שליט”א בניו יורק.*

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And the machine translation of what this says:

*Likutey Halakhot, Laws of Awakening in the Morning, Law 1.**

It explains that the final redemption depends on the fact that people will rise at midnight, and Rabbi Nathan details two types of individuals – the “righteous” and the “fearful.”

That is, the righteous are those who rise at midnight to conduct a midnight rectification, to study and pray.**

The “fearful” refers to a different type, who get up at midnight out of fear of the missiles, waking up due to the alarms to go to the shelters.**

From this, one may understand a bit of what the Rabbi means when he has been mentioning the time of chatzot – midnight – for quite a while, and for several days how Khamenei tries to wake everyone up at midnight, and now even Trump, who also named his operation “Midnight.”*

*At first glance, it sounds like the Rabbi is making a joke, but according to what is explained here, it is clear that this is really connected to the missiles and the war, that everyone should rise at midnight, even if it is only out of fear, as the final redemption depends on it!!*

*Wonder of wonders and to be understood well.**

Written by students of the Rabbi Shlit”a in New York.*

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Here’s the screenshot of the Likutey Halachot this is taking about:

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Remember that email I quoted last week, from a reader who started giving some money regularly to the Rav’s Kollel Chatzot?

Here’s a snippet:

I also have been sending the Kollel Chatzot their allotments and I see that has also brought about an amazing sense of peace in my entire body and especially my mind.

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The Shuvu Banim Kollel Chatzot gets up every single night, to recite the Tikkun Chatzot, as well as other prayers and Torah study.

I’ve been sending them something every month for a couple of years, already, partially because I want the zchut of someone including me and my family in their Tikkun Chatzot prayers.

Dafka, compared to most of the people I know, we’ve been sleeping pretty well, the last few days of bombardments….

Join the dots yourself.

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So, go HERE to pay some money to Shuvu Banim, with the intention of doing a pidyon kollel, so this whole horrible war will hopefully screech to an end.

And / or go HERE to give some money to the Kollel Chatzot of Shuvu Banim, so at least while it’s still going on, you can get a good night’s sleep.

And may we just hear good news.

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PS: Here’s what Shimshon sent me, from the Noam Elimelech:

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FOOTNOTES: