On this date, Murad IV, sultan of the Ottoman Empire, recaptured Baghdad from the Persian Shah after a forty-day siege. The Jews of Baghdad, who had suffered under the Shah’s tenure, celebrated this day each year to praise G‑d for rescuing them from Persian rule. According to legend, the Jews assisted in the capture by secretly conveying a message to the Sultan about a breach in the wall through which his forces could enter the city.
There is an outer world and there is an inner world. As deep as you penetrate, as high as you reach, there is always something breathing inside.
The outer world is made of things. Breathing inside the things are words.
Words are the outside. Inside the words are stories.
The story is the outside. Inside the story is a thought.
Thoughts are the outside. Inside the thoughts is a great light.
At the origin of all light is the beginning that cannot be known.
The outside we can touch and come to know.
The inside—we must wait and be still, so that it may speak to us.
As it did at Sinai. As it does whenever we learn Torah with all our heart and soul.