A Chassid's thoughts on Mashiach and Redemption
Published and Copyright (c) 2002 by
Sichos In English
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The halachic definition of dawn - alos hashachar - is when the rays of the sun first begin to appear in the corner of the horizon. It's well more than an hour before sunrise.[1] Outside it's dark and unless you look very carefully, you might think that it's deep night.
In 5751 (1991), when the Rebbe announced:[2] "We are standing on the threshold of the future Redemption. Mashiach's coming is no longer a dream of a distant future, but an imminent reality which will very shortly become fully manifest, it was dawn. Few but he were able to discern the light that was beginning to shine.
As he spoke about the issue week after week, day after day, the idea began to hit home. More and more people began to conceive of Redemption as a possibility and even as reality.
But to reach daylight - for Redemption to become overtly apparent in the world at large - it has to be internalized within our thought system and become the ordinary way in which we conceive of our lives and the world around us. This is our objective in "From Dawn to Daylight."
Notes:
- (Back to text) In Shiurei Tziyun, sec. 37, R. Chayim Naeh speaks of 72 minutes, 90 minutes, and 2 hours before sunrise as valid halachic options for the definition of the time of dawn and states that one should be careful to observe the stringencies that result from all opinions. Yagdil Torah 70:182 elaborates on 72 minutes before sunrise as being the figure to be adhered to. See the notes to the translations of Shulchan Aruch HaRav, sec. 18.
- (Back to text) Sound the Great Shofar, p. 47.
