Purim is one of Judaism’s most joyous and spirited holidays. The scent of freshly baked hamantaschen fills Jewish homes, the laughter of children dressed in vibrant costumes echoes in the streets, and the rhythmic clatter of noisemakers drowns out the name of the wicked Haman. It’s a day of celebration, a festival of survival, a testament to the Jewish people’s resilience.
But when Purim arrived in 2024, many struggled with a question that weighed heavily on their hearts: How can we rejoice when so many of our brothers and sisters still languish in the terror tunnels of Gaza? Was it right to dance and sing while others suffered unimaginable torment in captivity? To some, unrestrained joy felt almost like betrayal.
But the hostages were not forgotten. Across the Jewish world, their names were whispered in fervent prayer, their faces gazed down from posters plastered on every street corner, and their plight echoed in the cries of protesters demanding their release. Jewish hearts pulsed with an unbreakable bond of responsibility. And yet, as a story from one recently freed hostage reveals, it was not only the Jewish people who refused to let their captive brethren be forgotten. God was watching.
A light in the depths of darkness
Omer Shem Tov, a 23-year-old Israeli, was among the hundreds kidnapped from the Nova music festival on Oct. 7, 2023. While he initially endured captivity alongside his friend, Itay Regev, who was freed during the November 2023 hostage exchange, Shem Tov would spend the next 450 days in solitary confinement, swallowed by the abyss of Hamas’s underground labyrinth.
His existence became a waking nightmare. Deprived of sunlight, tormented by his captors and starved to the brink of collapse, he was shuffled from building to building, tunnel to tunnel, always in darkness, always alone. Amid this suffocating gloom, a sliver of light miraculously found its way into his hands.
According to an interview with Israeli Channel 13 news, Shem Tov’s parents, Malachi and Shelley, revealed that his captors occasionally provided him with reading material left behind by Israeli Defense Forces operating in Gaza. Among these scattered remnants of literature was something profoundly unexpected—an edition of Dvar Malchut, a weekly Chabad Torah publication.
A collection of Torah insights, Psalms, Pirkei Avot (“The Ethics of Our Fathers”) and Chassidic discourses, it became the spiritual lifeboat that kept him afloat. Within its pages, he found a maamar—a Chassidic discourse from the Lubavitcher Rebbe—Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson—expounding on the biblical tale of Joseph, the son of Jacob who was betrayed by his brothers, sold into slavery, and imprisoned in Egypt.
Joseph’s ordeal—his wrongful imprisonment, the bitter disappointment of being forgotten by his fellow prisoners, the weight of despair pressing against his chest—was eerily familiar. And yet, as the Rebbe explained, Joseph did not crumble. He remained steadfast for he knew he was never truly alone. His unshakable trust in God sustained him, for he understood that even in the darkest pits, a Jew carries within them an eternal spark of the Divine. The discourse continued by expounding upon the Kabbalistic concept of Or Ein Sof lematah matah ad ein tachlit—“The Infinite Light of God descends downward without end.”
This mystical truth teaches that no place is beyond God’s reach, not even the darkest abyss. His presence extends to the loftiest heavens and the deepest shadows of human suffering, illuminating even those who seem lost or forgotten. For Shem Tov, alone in the suffocating tunnels beneath Gaza, these words were not mere philosophy; they were survival. If God’s light could penetrate even the depths of exile and imprisonment, then despair was never absolute. He was not abandoned. He was not forgotten.
A hidden hand in history
The fact that Dvar Malchut made its way into Shem Tov’s hands wasn’t just luck—it was a striking example of how hidden miracles manifest in the most unexpected places. It was one of those moments that feel too precise to be random—like a whisper from Above, a nudge reminding us that hidden miracles are woven into the fabric of Jewish history. In fact, that’s the whole story of Purim.
When Mordechai and the Jews of Persia were sentenced to annihilation, they were initially engulfed in fear and sorrow. The biblical book of Esther describes the scene by stating. “In every province that the king’s command and decree reached, there was great mourning among the Jews, with fasting, weeping, and wailing, and everybody lay in sackcloth and ashes.” (Esther 4:1-3).
And yet, God was there. Hidden, but there. The Megillah is unique among biblical texts—God’s name is never mentioned. But His presence is felt in every twist of fate, in every unseen force guiding the story’s narrative arc.
In 1958, the Lubavitcher Rebbe shared a remarkable insight about God’s hidden presence in Haman’s gallows. The Megillah states that the gallows were constructed using wood, or etz in Hebrew. The Rebbe explained that the wood Haman intended to use to hang Mordechai had a history—a sacred one. Centuries earlier, our forefather Abraham had welcomed three angels beneath the shade of a tree, also referred to as etz (Bereishit 18:4).
Abraham’s kindness and hospitality left an imprint, a spiritual signature infusing the tree with a deep sense of holiness. When Abraham’s tree became a vessel for kindness and Divine protection, it set in motion a force that made it impossible for a wooden structure of evil—like Haman’s gallows—to succeed.
In other words, in the spiritual realm, Haman’s plot had been preempted before it even began by the holy actions of prior generations.
This is the lesson of Purim. Even when all seems lost, even when darkness reigns, God watches over his people.
The Talmud (Tanchuma, Toldot 5) states: “The Jewish people are like a solitary sheep surrounded by seventy wolves, yet they are not devoured, for the Shepherd watches over them.” From the gallows of Mordechai to the tunnels of Gaza, from ancient Persia to modern Israel, this truth remains unshaken. Time and again, what seemed like certain destruction was transformed into salvation, revealing the hidden hand of Divine providence at work.
The story of Omer Shem Tov is a modern-day Purim miracle—a revelation of the hidden hand guiding history. Just as Joseph was freed, just as the Jews of Persia were saved, so, too, will all those who are still captive today be brought home.
Purim reminds us that salvation can come in the blink of an eye and that even in our darkest moments, we are never really alone. As we celebrate Purim this year with song and laughter, we do so not with guilt but with unwavering faith. When the royal decree was annulled and the Jews were saved, it stated: Layehudim hayetah orah vesimcha vesason vikar! “For the Jews, there was light, joy, gladness and honor.” (Esther 8:16)
May it be so again, speedily in our days.