BS”D

Author’s Note: I have selected to leave this reflection/meditation of sorts rather vague and abstract.  It is open to interpretation.  I invite you to enjoy it in a quite place, to delve deep and toss ideas around, and to allow your heart, soul and mind to forge intriguing connections.

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The Jewish People have been compared to a dove, numerous times throughout Scripture and Talmud.  You may enjoy learning more about the dove’s symbolism in Judaism from an article on Chabad.org, accessible here.

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When will the dove come home to where she belongs?  When shall she return from the midst of the raging sea’s tempest, the “mayim rabim”* of this temporal world, to the warmth and security of the Ark which is her Anchor of life?

Once she returns, she will even bear her fruits in her beak, tokens of devotion to her mission and signs of life from her bitter journey on which there is no place to set a stable foot.  Any rest is surreal, like a fleeting dream; a light slumber, only to awaken with a jolt to a harsh and stubborn reality; for among all foreign lands she is a wanderer, except for the one place where she belongs.  All the more poignant now is the pain and yearning for her nest built upon the ruins of her Beloved’s altar. **

The dove… disenchanted from her golden nest, captured and led astray, she flutters helplessly, wallowing in the filth of the city alleyways, her wings injured, now caked in dust.  In her association – even intimate – with the callous falcon and crow, she is dragged down.  Yet, it’s fleeting; the faithful dove forever carries the truth in her heart, and flies home to her Beloved, ‘her feathers covered with silver and her pinions with brilliant gold.’***

Her return fulfilled, with a pleasant voice she has aroused the affection of Her Beloved in her earnest; cleansed and proven worthy, her appearance is comely and she is welcomed back home, to Him.  She settles ‘in the clefts of the rock,’ in the crevices of the wall’s ancient stones, where she is sheltered by the embrace of her Beloved, Who hovers lovingly above forever.****

Come home, little dove, to the place where you belong.  Come home, little dove, to be reunited with your One True mate.  Come home, little dove… remember who you are.

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Perhaps you will find inspiring the following song by Tzlil V’Zemer Boys Choir, entitled “The Little Bird is Calling:”

 

REFERENCE NOTES:

*Mayim Rabim – Hebrew Literally, “many waters;” a euphemism for the temptations to copious pleasure in the physicality of this world

**Inspired by Tehillim 84:4

***A slight reworking of Tehillim 68:3

****Inspired by Shir Hashirim, chapter 2