This Wednesday is Tu B'Av - the 15th of Av. Many good things happened on this date (see details).
The Talmud recounts how, on this day, the single women of Jerusalem danced in the vineyards to find husbands. And there were three types of women:
1) The pretty ones, who would say to the young men "look how beautiful we are, because woman is for beauty.".
2) Those from good families, who said "look at our family, because a woman is for her children.".
3) The ugly ones, who said "take us in the name of heaven".
Those dancing maidens are not just an ancient story. There is a lesson for us today about how we must demand God's redemption, including salvation from this war that plagues us.
The maidens symbolize the souls of the Jews. And these maidens cry out to God to marry them, that is, to reveal Himself to them, each based on her merits:
1) The beautiful ones represent souls who have reached a perfect level of love and fear of God in the observance of mitzvot. They plead with Him to accept them because of their high level.
2) Those from good families have the merit of observing the Mitzvot without fear and love for God, as they expressed, the woman is for her fruits (the children) - the Mitzvot in the case of the soul, which are its fruits.
3) And what about the ugly ones? There are souls that have no merit. That's why they said, "Take us in the name of Heaven." This symbolizes that the soul asks God to take it and elevate it simply because it is a soul, for His sake, not because of the soul's merits.
We have no merit. We must demand that God redeem and save us. Because we are the people He chose and because He breathed a portion of Himself into us. We want Messiah NOW!