WHERE DO YOU BELONG?

Today is the New Month of Nisan,  Rosh Chodesh Nisan, the month of miracles and wonders, as we see the open miracles in Israel and pray for a complete and speedy victory, Amen.

The first mitzvah given to the Jewish people, while still in Egypt, days before redemption, was not about freedom, faith, or even morality.

It was about the New Month of Nisan when the new moon will arrive.

“This month shall be for you the head of months…”
G-d shows Moshe a thin sliver of moonlight and says: “Like this—see it, and sanctify it.”

Moshe struggled. What exactly qualifies as “new”? How much light is enough?
So G-d pointed with His finger: This. This is what you must learn to see.

Why this mitzvah first? Why here, in the darkness of Egypt?

Because this is not just a calendar law.
It is the foundation of Jewish existence.

It is the ability to see light when there is almost none.

A Note from a Soldier

This past week, a story emerged, one that feels like a living commentary on this mitzvah.

A 20-year-old soldier, Hillel Nehemiah Ofen, tragically passed away during training. In his backpack, they found a handwritten note. Not long. Not polished. But it carried the weight of a lifetime.

It began with two words:

“Ani Shayach — I belong.”

He wrote:

I belong to a family, a community, a nation.
I belong to my country, to humanity, to history, and to the future.
I belong to joy and to pain, to fear and to hope.
Everything that happens to my people and me, I belong to it.
And it is my duty to preserve it.
And now, for that duty, I am yours.

Who writes like that?

A young man with no filters, no performance, no branding—just truth.
In a world obsessed with standing out, he understood something deeper:

Real strength is not in standing apart. It is in belonging.

The Secret of the Moon

And suddenly, the mitzvah of the new moon makes sense.

The Jewish people were born with a unique vision, not physical, but spiritual.
A memory etched into the soul from the Exodus: that what looks like darkness is concealment, not absence.

The moon doesn’t generate light.
It reflects it.

Its glow is faint, fragile, easily missed. Yet it carries within it the power of the sun.

That sliver of moon is the symbol of Jewish vision:
To detect the hidden light in the darkness.
To recognize presence in concealment.
To find G-d even when He is not obvious.

That is why G-d said: “See this and sanctify.”

If you can see this sliver,
You can survive history.

You Already Know How to See

The verse says: This month of Nisan is for you the first month.”

For you, because you already have the ability.

Because of what your soul has seen, you already know how to look at the world differently.

Even when the sun is gone…
Even when the full moon is hidden…
Even when all you have is a thin, trembling crescent—

You can still say, "This is holy." This is a beginning. This matters.

And in that moment, you are saying:

I belong.

Belonging vs. Emptiness

Today, a person can have everything, success, wealth, admiration—and still feel empty.

Because belonging is not about how many people see you.
It’s about whether you see the light within yourself.

If I cannot feel that inner spark,
that Divine current is flowing through my life
Then no amount of external validation will save me from loneliness.

But if I can see even a sliver…
If I can feel even a trace…

Then everything changes.

Then I can say:

I belong to life.
I belong to holiness.
I belong to something eternal.

Seeing Light in Real Time

This isn’t theoretical.

It is happening now.

In the darkness of the past months, we have seen flashes of moonlight.

A story from a recent trip to Israel captures this:

A group visited a hospital and unexpectedly encountered Sapir Cohen and her boyfriend, Sasha, recently freed from captivity. Sapir shared how, before everything happened, she began saying Tehillim daily. 

That practice carried her through the unimaginable.

Standing there was a man named Steve. Months earlier, he had heard her speak and thought to himself: There’s no way her boyfriend will survive.

His wife responded differently. She began lighting an extra Shabbat candle each week for him.

And now, here they were.  Face to Face.

The person they prayed for… standing right in front of them.

A sliver of moonlight.

The First Mitzvah, Revisited

Now we understand.

The first mitzvah is not just to mark time.

It is to create vision.

To train people to never surrender to darkness.
To never define reality by what is obvious.
To never lose the ability to say:

There is light here. Even now.

And if I can see it.

I can sanctify it.
I can build with it.
I can live by it.

Final Thought

You don’t need the full moon.

You don’t need clarity, certainty, or perfection.

You need one thing:

The courage to see a sliver…
and say

“This is enough to begin.”

And in that moment, you fulfill the first mitzvah ever given:

You see.
You sanctify.
And you remember

You belong.

Shabbat Shalom and Chodesh Tov,

Rabbi Yoseph Geisinsky