"Lo, a nation rising up like a lioness — in Torah — and like a lion rearing up — in deed (the Gaon in "Aderess Eliyahu")å
The gemara in Sanhedrin notes that all of the wicked Bilaam's blessings turned out to be curses except for one: "How goodly are your tents Yaakov, your [mishkenos] Yisroel." Rabbi Yitzchok Eizik Chaver noted that throughout the Exile, a time of concealed Divine Providence for Jewry, there is no existence for our People except for the Torah.
Bilaam's intent was to curse, to abolish the houses of worship and of study during the exile so that Jewry would die out altogether. In His great mercy, Hashem established this blessing over the botei medrash where Torah was being studied so as to preserve them until the future Redemption.
The gemara at the end of Kesuvos states: In the generation in which the son of David, the Moshiach, will appear, there will be an indictment against Jewry. Rashi comments that many adversaries and antagonists will stand up against Jewry, coming upon them with rapidity, in other words, harsh decrees following upon harsh decrees.
Jewish existence lies in the Torah, so that towards the end of the period of the 'footsteps heralding Moshiach,' the Evil One will mobilize all of his powers to uproot Torah from Jewry through decree upon decree by removing Torah students from the habitat of their yeshivos to prevent the effective power of the Geula via the Torah to prevail.
In this present period of the war between Persia and Rome, our Sages say that there is no natural means of survival for Klal Yisroel outside of Torah study.
Therefore, it is our role in these times of the proliferation of our adversaries and enemies who seek to obliterate our Torah world, to rise up mightily through rededicated toil in Torah, for were it not for this power in Eretz Yisroel, there would be no strength for Jewry to exist in this darkness of exile.
Whoever sees our salvation in the miracles which we have experienced these past weeks as something natural, is undermining the very fundamentals of our faith which hails the power of Jewry as being Divinely guided and protected by Hashem and the power of His Torah. For were it not for the merit of Torah, our people would not be able to exist under natural circumstances.
This distinction of tens of thousands Jews toiling in Torah and those supporters of it who literally surrendered their lives and wealth for it through love and joy is what has stood us by in those difficult times when we were threatened with annihilation.
Sadly enough, we hear the exuberant cries of 'our might and the strength of our hands' being trumpeted in our midst. These are exceptionally dangerous for our people. Have we not seen with our own eyes how this idol of self worship was shattered in the massacre of Simchas Torah, 5784?
Even before, our godol hador HaRav Shach regarded this misguided trend in the Six Day War of 5727 with dread through the elated triumphant voices of victory, when he admonished the public with all his might and fervor not to be carried away with the events, and to always realize that our very existence depends on the power of Torah. The Vilna Gaon implied that this was the meaning of 'Lo, a people rising up like a lioness,' meaning rising up through the power of Torah.
On the Shabbos of Behaalosecha, when the war erupted, we read in the Haftorah of the vision of the Novi Zecharya about the Menorah of the Bayis Sheini where he prophesied, "Not through armed power nor through might, says Hashem, but only through My spirit." This is the spirit of the Torah resting upon the Jewish people, as found in the posuk, "My spirit which is upon you, and My words which I placed in your moutè'
