Parshas Korach: Kefira? Heck yeah!

Korach didn’t want to destroy holiness. He wanted it. He just wanted it loud.

“ALL THE PEOPLE ARE HOLY!” he shouted,

And he wasn’t wrong. But maybe he was scared.

Scared he wouldn’t feel seen unless he forced his way in.

So he rose up, disrupted the system, made himself louder than everyone else.

Toxic masculinity in sacred disguise.

But Moshe?

He fell on his face. He cried. He listened. He made space for the pain.

He had seen the Shechina beside God… and let Her live inside him.

Korach stormed. Moshe softened.

Korach demanded fire. Moshe held stillness.

—

A playfully spicy Israeli rabbi asked me recently what I write about.

“Sometimes Torah. Sometimes God. Sometimes other things.”
“Other things like what?” he grinned. “Kefira? You talk to god? He talks back? What does he say?”

Honestly? Yeah.

My Kefira: Believing that God talks to me, and responds when I talk to Him. The more I speak, the more I see. The more I listen, the more He speaks. Rinse. Lather. Repeat. Not through thunder or tablets. but through a rinsed mouth. A recycling truck. Once I got quiet enough, I heard the whisper. Not from above— from within. Soft. Feminine. Fierce. She didn’t shout like Korach. She didn’t need to. She just waited for me to stop pushing, stop proving, stop performing. She waited for me to come home. To myself. To Her. To the Shechina I spent years ignoring. And when I did…things started to shift.

Through the hygienist saying, “If you feel like you’re drowning, raise your left hand.”

That was Tefillin.

Through the stopped car in front of me at a red light.

Sof Zman Krias Shema. — And maybe that’s why my life looks different now. I stopped needing to be right. I stopped trying to prove I was chosen. And just started letting God choose me. That’s not rebellion. That’s surrender. Not grabbing the crown like Korach— just staying grounded where the earth didn’t open.

—

From when I was a kid, I used to think being a man meant strength.

Sharpness. Control. Answers.

But really, it was led by fear.

Fear of being soft. Of being hurt again.

So I armored up. I almost became a professional at it.

Just under 10,000 days of practice.

Building walls. Perfecting silence. Training myself not to feel too much. Or need too much.

At least that’s what I thought I had to tell myself.. I almost mastered it…

But I’m no master, Hashem is. And his Shechina is slowly melting what fear once froze.

Chassidus gave me the language to share it:

Each soul has two sides: the Mashpia and Mekabel. Masculine and feminine.

Hashem and Shechina.

If the Shechina lives in the feminine, maybe the way back to Him, starts with how I honor Her.

If I want to be truly masculine, I need to make space for the feminine soul inside me,

in presence, in softness, in the courage to receive.

But I’m a man. What do I really know about carrying the feminine?

So I look at my wife, my Eishes Chayil.

Not just as my wife, my “support”. But as someone carrying the Divine.

If I can honor that in her… maybe I can honor it in me, too.

Maybe that’s how I become whole.

—

So what’s been changing?

Less noise.

Less phone out around her and the kids.

Less narrating what I did “for her.”

Just doing it. Quietly. Without needing applause.

Less pushing.

Not fixing or explaining. Not convincing. Just listening.

Holding space for her truth, especially when it’s different from mine.

And sharing mine too, not to win, just to be heard.

More presence.

More stillness.

Making eye contact by the simple questions.

Getting her a glass of water before she asks.

And I’ll still get it wrong sometimes. I’m not perfect.

Still flawed. Still human. Still learning how to stay soft when I’m triggered.

—

But I’m choosing more intentionally now.

To succeed as often as I can. And one more time than that.

To keep showing up, not perfectly, but honestly.

So no, this isn’t Korach’s fire.

This is Moshiach energy. (Thank you, Modi.)

It comes like thunder rolling across the sky. It looks like a man becoming soft enough to carry light.

Like a Jew realizing the Geulah may have already begun.

Because this time,

Hashem isn’t opening the earth to swallow anyone.

The Shechina is opening our hearts instead.

To hold. To listen. To receive. To welcome Her back in.

And that? That’s how we’ll bring Moshiach.

Not by grabbing the crown.

But by becoming the vessel that lets it rest gently, right where it belongs.

Here. Now. Forever.

Be soft. Stay Strong.

Good Shabbos ❤️

-Berke

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