Floods in Mecca: Isaiah’s pre-Messiah “road through the wilderness”

Saudi Arabia has been struck by severe weather conditions, with heavy rain and flash flooding affecting much of its Red Sea coast. The Saudi Red Crescent Authority in the Mecca Region has heightened its preparedness in response to severe weather warnings issued by the National Center for Meteorology on Tuesday.

The impact of the extreme weather has been significant. Social media images depicted cars stranded and swept away by torrential rains in Medina. In a tragic turn of events, two bodies were recovered from a wadi in Dhahab in Al Lith on the Red Sea coast, as reported by local news site Okaz, citing the country’s civil defense.

On Friday, Saudi Arabia’s National Centre of Meteorology issued a red alert for rainfall in several regions in the west and southwest of the country. Meteorologists warned of strong winds, reduced visibility, hail, and thunderstorms in affected areas.

In response to the situation, authorities have mobilized thousands of workers and staff to manage rainfall at the Grand Mosque and the Prophet’s Mosque in Mecca. The General Presidency for the Affairs of the Prophet’s Mosque has implemented measures to ensure worshippers can perform their religious duties comfortably and safely.

This severe weather event follows similar incidents in recent months. In April, floods and heavy rain hit northern parts of Saudi Arabia, leading to road closures and school disruptions. Footage shared on social media showed flash floods in Al-Ula and Al-Madinah, home to Al-Masjid Al-Nabawi, Islam’s second holiest site.

The recent floods in Saudi Arabia come just days after similar events in neighboring UAE and Oman, unusual occurrences for this time of year. In November 2022, Saudi Arabia experienced coastal flooding due to heavy rain, particularly affecting the city of Jeddah, where two people lost their lives.

These recurring extreme weather events highlight a shift in weather patterns. They raise concerns about the infrastructure preparedness of Gulf nations to deal with such conditions. Many cities in these countries were built without adequate storm drainage systems, as urban planners in the 20th century did not anticipate dramatic changes in the typically arid terrain of the Arabian Peninsula.

The floods in Saudi Arabia, following closely on those in Dubai, underscore the need for Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries to develop long-term strategies to handle these weather extremes. They also emphasize the urgency of upgrading infrastructural capabilities to cope with an increasingly unstable global climate.

The scenario is strongly reminiscent of the verse in Isaiah describing the end of days:

I am about to do something new; Even now it shall come to pass, Suddenly you shall perceive it: I will make a road through the wilderness And rivers in the desert. Isaiah 43:19

Rabbi Aryeh Weingarten, who has been working his entire life to help others through his charitable organization, noted that despite God’s promise in the generation of Noah not to destroy the world by flood, the Messiah would be preceded by a period of global floods.

Rabbi Weingarten referred to the explanation of this verse by Rabbi Judah Loew ben Bezalel, a 16th-century Torah scholar known as the Maharal of Prague.

“The Maharal explained this verse as meaning that Noah and his sons, who represented all of mankind, ‘walked with Hashem’, meaning that they went in God’s ways, which were the laws of nature. All of mankind was instructed to obey God via the laws of nature.”

Rabbi Weingarten explained that the laws of nature are represented by the number seven, which is why the world was created in seven days.

“The six represents all directions, and then the seventh, which is the Shabbat, which brings the neshama, the soul, into the center of reality.”

“The sons of Noah and all of mankind, all of the 70 nations that came from them, were commanded to serve God through nature, through the seven Noahide laws,” he explained. “But Israel is commanded to transcend nature,” “This began with Abraham circumcising himself and his sons on the eighth day, one day more than the creation of the world. All the nations come to Jerusalem for the seven days of Sukkot, but Israel completes the feast with Shemini Atzeret, the eighth day only for Israel.”

“The nations serve God through nature, as does Israel, but we complete them by transcending nature in the service of Hashem. We do this to be the intermediary and one step closer to God, who is beyond nature.”

“That is why the Exodus began with wonders of nature in Egypt, the natural put phenomenal plagues. But for us to become Israel in the service of God, the redemption from Egypt transcended nature, first at the splitting of the sea, and then at Mount Sinai.”

“The Exodus was the template for the final redemption. First, the Messiah from the House of Joseph will prepare the land of Israel. This is a natural process. But this is just the preparation for the Messiah from the House of David, which will complete the Third Temple and establish the Davidic Dynasty. This will be an explicitly miraculous process that transcends nature.”

“When the Jews were in Israel, if a Jew were sick, he would pray. If there were an epidemic, we would bring a sacrifice. If we served Hashem properly, the rain would fall. Israel was able to access the transcendent aspect of serving Hashem until the Temple was destroyed and we were taken out of the land of Israel. We then were among the nations; like them, our service of God was restricted to the seven planes of nature.”

Close to the end

“We are now close to the arrival of the Messiah. We are in the process of redemption, just like the Jews just before they left Egypt. We have seen wonders of nature. There were massive floods in Europe and China, earthquakes, and all kinds of natural phenomena. These are signs that nature is changing. With the coronavirus, we saw one virus shut down the entire world. This is astounding in an age when medicine performs so many wonders.”

“This is moving us towards the stage of redemption when Israel connects to God by transcending nature, by going up to the level of eight. When Israel does this, when the Third Temple is present to allow us to access this conduit for serving Hashem, Israel can serve as it should, as a nation of priests to connect the world to Hashem.”

Information about Rabbi Weingarten’s organization, “Karmey Chesed” can be seen on their website.

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