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By Rabbi Yehoshua S. Hecht

On Wednesday, June 7^th CBS reported the following:

“The worst air in the U.S. Wednesday morning, is in upstate New York from Syracuse to Binghamton, where the air quality has reached the worst level — hazardous. That air will move toward New York City and Philadelphia on Wednesday afternoon and evening.”

The report continues “Tuesday brought the worst air quality to New York City since the 1960s, officials said, with New York City Mayor Eric Adams calling it an “unprecedented event.” The mayor urged New Yorkers to avoid going outside if they can”.

The apocalypse of the quality of air unfolding above us is an event that is not unrelated to the current atmosphere of rebellion against G-D and disregard for morality and ethics.

The utter indifference for Biblical values and standards by the so called “woke” agenda is now manifesting itself in the very air we breathe. The pollution and particulate affecting our environment and capability for breathing fresh air, is sending us a message from the “heavens above” that we need to get our act together before it becomes too late. The crass disregard and open hostility to those who profess faith in G-D is reason enough to cry out as recoded in the Book of Jonah “Arise, go to the great city of Nineveh, and admonish it with the admonition which I will tell you …in another forty-days, Nineveh will be overturned!”

The smoke that is affecting many millions of people from the forest-fires in Canada, and the pollution by the Popocatepetl Volcano right outside of Mexico City, is “covering towns with layers of volcanic ash in recent days after the country’s most active volcano began erupting more vigorously again, causing disruptions to air travel and classes to be suspended”.

This volcano has been spewing water vapor, carbon dioxide and other gases including sulfur dioxide — along with huge amounts of volcanic ash.

I suggest that both the East Coast and the West Coast of this once great USA is getting clobbered with these so called “natural calamities” so that we peer through the smoke and hear the message in the air, that June Month, is not the time for misdirected pride and celebration of immorality and every kind of expression of hedonism and human self-indulgence.

Rather we ought to pay heed to the smoke and fire that engulfed Mount Sinai at Revelation and the giving of the Ten Commandments. This is precisely what humanity ought to acknowledge and celebrate.

The uplifting of humanity, without exception. Indeed, all descendants of Adam and Eve are worthy of acknowledgment and respect. However, the celebration of activities or lifestyles that contravene that which the Torah prohibits, is something that should not be celebrated.

In the final analysis, it is G-D through His Torah that sets the rules of personal conduct and the guidelines for humanity. All of us, being progeny of Noah, are commanded to observe the Seven Universal Laws that apply to every person without exception. The “woke” agenda, conforms to none of them.

In the words of Ethics of our Fathers: Who is considered honorable? It is he who honors others. (Chapter 4:1)

Let us all peer through the smoke screen and accept the truth for what it is. It will most assuredly bring peace, prosperity, salvation, and redemption for all the world, Amen.

Rabbi Yehoshua S. Hecht serves as director of Beth Israel Chabad of Westport/Norwalk CT., and is a Member Presidium Rabbinical Alliance of America.

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