Rbbi Mark Dratch shares that:
A few days ago, I went for a walk, just to get out of the house, and noticed that the trees in my neighborhood are blooming. How crazy that the earth is still acting like things are normal.
My wife and I recalled the blessing we say when one sees blossoming fruit trees for the first time during the month of Nissan
בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה ה’ אֱ-לֹהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם שֶׁלֹּא חִסַּר בְּעוֹלָמוֹ כְּלוּם וּבָרָא בוֹ בְּרִיּוֹת טוֹבוֹת וְאִילָנוֹת טוֹבוֹת לֵהָנוֹת בָּהֶ בְּנֵי אָדָם.
Blessed are You, L‑rd our G‑d, King of the universe, Who has made nothing lacking in His world, and created in it goodly creatures and goodly trees to give mankind pleasure.
We actually say that NOTHING is LACKING! Really? The world, especially now, is so broken.
Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm has an amazing explanation—he calls this blessing of the spring, permission to create a “holy fiction.”
For just a moment, in that one moment in time, when we witness the amazing miracle of rebirth in the trees, our breath is taken away, and in that one moment- we create the “holy fiction” that everything really is perfect.
The bracha/blessing gives us permission to see the Holy and good even amidst the imperfections of the world, and certainly in the very imperfect time in which we find ourselves today.
Rabbi Mark Dratch concludes: I find myself coming back to the wisdom of Dr. Lamm again and again this season. I am inspired daily, even hourly, by the amazing dedication and love being poured into our kehillot by leaders and laymembers alike. In any given moment, I find myself smiling and thanking G-d for sending the right people to us at this time, and in that way, and in so many ways, I find that I am surrounded by the Holy Fiction of the perfection of many, many mini moments of glorious GOOD happening all around us.
We enter in the season of our redemption, with humility and prayer for health and safety for the world, and with the fervent prayer and wish that we are an even better community through this process and that we have grown from these moments of Holy Fiction to become even more who we are meant to become.