A PAINFUL AND MESSY BIRTH

Anton La Guardia visits an

Israeli village which is preparing to receive the Messiah

Jerusalem THE bearded, black-hatted gentlemen of the Israeli village of Kfar Chabad have been in a state of heightened excitement since the outbreak of the Gulf crisis. They share none of the fears of their less devout countrymen that war will spread to the Promised Land or that deadly chemicals will rain from Saddam Hussein's missiles. Not publicly, at least. Instead, Kfar Cha- bad, a religious community of some 4,000 souls founded in 1949 by the Lubavitch Orthodox Jewish movement, is confident that the cataclysm gathering force in the Gulf is a portent of the Messiah's coming. A sign on the door of the movement's village headquarters tells the passer-by, in the light of the Gulf crisis: 'Prepare your- self. Prepare yourself. The time of redemp- tion is near.' Followers are urged to study the Torah even more intensely and 'streng- then love and unity'.

The 88-year-old Lubavitcher leader, known as Rebbe Rabbi Menachem Schneerson, who lives in Brooklyn, New York, has told followers there is no need to buy gas masks because the eyes of God watch over Israel at all times. Buying emergency supplies is not only unnecessary but also harmful because it would drive up the price of food for others.

To ordinary Israelis, currently seeking any civil defence advice they can find, such attitudes may appear complacent. But the Lubavitchers quote the scriptures and rab- binical tradition to support their confi- dence. The argument is intricate, but suffice it to say that one collection of rabbinical teachings predicts that the day of redemption will be preceded by strife among all nations in the world, caused by a confrontation between an Arabian king (King Fahd) who is provoked by a Persian king (according to the Lubavitchers, this fits Saddam, who is a ruler of the Persian Gulf, although the Iraqi leader may dis- agree). The facts do not fit perfectly, but, given that the prophecy was made in the 13th century, it is close enough for the Lubavitchers.

Even more attractive is the prediction that Jews will endure 'neither suffering nor subjection' and that the Messiah will stand on the Temple roof in Jerusalem to proc- laim the Jews' redemption. The second Jewish Temple was destroyed by the Ro- mans and on its site now stand the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock. Before the day of redemption, the Luba- vitchers believe, the Temple will be re- built. So one would expect ample evidence of the approach of that fateful day.

'The adrenalin is flowing,' said Rabbi Yosel Aronov, executive director of the Lubavitchers' movement in Israel; 'we feel that now is the time to prepare ourselves to accept the Messiah.'

The more purist Orthodox sects oppose the very idea of setting up a Jewish state before the Messiah's coming and some

have even opened a dialogue with Israel's sworn enemy, the Palestine Liberation. Organisation. But the Lubavitchers play an active part in the Zionist state. Israel's system of proportional representation, which usually only permits coalition gov- ernments to be formed with the slimmest of majorities, has given religious parties a disproportionate influence in the political system. At the last election, the Lubavitch- ers were instrumental in preventing the Labour Party from coming to power.

The Lubavitchers are a Hassidic offshoot born in the Russian town of Lubavitch. They are also known as Chabad — a term created by merging the Hebrew words for wisdom, understanding and knowledge — or, more colloquially, Chabadniks. The Lubavitchers are not a closed, scholarly sect, but rather a mystical movement which developed among the poor of the Jewish ghettoes. It vigorously seeks out new fol- lowers, rather like Christian evangelists. A young couple in Tel Aviv is as likely to be approached by a Chabadnik as a soldier serving on the front in the Golan Heights. When the Israeli army embarked on its ill-fated invasion of Lebanon in 1982, Lubavitcher vans, known as 'Mitzvah tanks', followed the troops to offer solace and to win new followers in the battlefield.

The Lubavitchers' educational and humanitarian work has become a major enterprise. In Kfar Chabad, officials may sport dark hats and full beards, but the sleeves of their tasselled shirts are firmly rolled up. The village, a few miles outside Tel Aviv, runs schools and training for more than 2,000 children from poor or broken homes. There are also some 200

'Wow! A genuine petrol lighter.'

Jewish children from Soviet towns affected by radiation from the damaged Chernobyl nuclear plant.

The village is bisected by the main Tel Aviv to Jerusalem highway. In other parts of Israel, religious zealots have taken to stoning motorists who breach the religious injunction against driving on the Sabbath. But fortunately for the country's road casualty figures, the Lubavitchers do not try to enforce the prohibition. Instead, an earth mound has been raised along the road to keep the speeding sinners discreet- ly out of sight.

The village's centre-piece stands on a dusty hilltop. It is a replica of the two- storey red-brick Lubavitcher headquarters in Brooklyn, which once housed an abor- tion clinic. The model is complete with lovingly reproduced stained glass windows, cast-iron grilles and the brass plate bearing the eastern parkway street number. Ordin- ary Chabadniks believe the building will house the aging Rebbe, should he move to Israel, but the movement's officials deny the story with a mixture of embarrassment and irritation.

Inside, young scholars study the scrip- tures and other religious works. My guide, a rotund• American Chabadnik, pointed out a corner of the entrance foyer. 'This is where the Rebbe stands in Brooklyn. He sometimes stays there for seven hours and gives a dollar bill to anybody who comes in and tells them to give it to somebody else. It is a way of teaching charity.'

The Rebbe is a prophetic figure to his followers. One American Chabadnik living in Jerusalem's old city, Moshe Schlass, admits, sotto voce, that he may be the Messiah himself. Schlass, who owned a macrobiotic restaurant in New York before rediscovering his faith and moving to Israel, is unperturbed by the preparations for war in the Gulf. 'We have been waiting for a long time for this moment,' he said with a New York drawl untempered by more than a decade in Israel. 'The whole process of the coming of the Messiah is like giving birth: it is painful and messy, but what comes out is a living child.'

His house stands a stone's throw away from the Wailing Wall, the surviving sec- tion of the second Jewish Temple. The first Temple was destroyed by the ancient Babylonians. It has not escaped the Israelis' notice that Saddam likes to see himself, among many heroic figures, as the modern embodiment of Nebuchadnezzar, the king who razed Jerusalem and sent the Jews into exile in Mesopotamia.

But for some Israelis, the prophecies of the Old Testament bode ill for Saddam in this time of crisis:

And the broad walls of Babylon shall be utterly overthrown, And her high gates shall he burned with fire; And the peoples shall labour for vanity, And the nations for the fire; And they shall be weary. (Jeremiah 51:51)