A Statement on the Tragic Loss of Hersh, Almog, Ori, Eden, Carmel, and Alex
כל המאבד נפש אחת (מישראל) מעלה עליו הכתוב כאילו איבד עולם מלא
Anyone who destroys a life, it is as though they have destroyed a whole world.
- Mishnah Sanhedrin Chapter 4
In the Jewish tradition, there is an idea that each person is in some way equivalent to an entire world. Perhaps it is the future generations that might have come from them if they had lived. Perhaps it is that each person is in the image of the limitless God, and cannot be reduced to a single number. Perhaps it is that we are all bound to one another, and when one person is murdered, we are all in some sense destroyed. The world that we lived in, that we shared with that person, is no more. The pain is certainly all of our pain.
On Saturday night, we got the news that 6 whole worlds were destroyed. I couldn’t do justice here to the lives of these precious people, and I won’t try. Each one a whole world. A web of relationships, hopes, fears, ideas. A reflection of the Creator, and part of our family.
No comfort is perhaps possible. What would comfort even mean in the face of such a loss?
We say, “May you be comforted among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.” Meaning your pain is part of the ocean of tears in which we all sink or swim. Meaning the answer to your pain is the answer to history. To the question, how can our human hearts continue in this world that includes suffering, death, and injustice?
In Jeremiah, 31:15 we are told the Biblical matriarch Rachel weeps for her children, “Thus said GOD: A cry is heard in Ramah, Wailing, bitter weeping. Rachel weeping for her children. She refuses to be comforted, for her children, who are gone.”
God tries to comfort her. To stop her tears. “Thus said GOD: Restrain your voice from weeping, Your eyes from shedding tears; For there is a reward for your labor —declares GOD: They shall return from the enemy’s land. And there is hope for your future —declares GOD: Your children shall return to their country.” (Ibid, 16-17)
The essence of this comfort is that it will be ok in the end. Your suffering will end. The exiles will return home. You will outlive your conquerors and again be sovereign in your land. In other words, history - time - will answer your pain. Your national story has a happy ending. Only God could promise this, and as comfort goes, this is probably as good as it gets.
But we are not told that our mother Rachel stops crying. Because while history might answer the pain and hope of a people, it's often cold comfort for a person. A mother. Whose child is taken from her.
“All the stones of the Old City Jerusalem were not worth even his little finger,” said the mother of
a fallen soldier. I care deeply about the Old City, the beating heart of Jerusalem. But as a mother, I understand. Maybe I even feel the same. For the close family and friends of these 6 worlds, I can only say we love you. We are with you in your suffering.
I believe in our national story. Our shared future, despite the grief of its unimaginable cost. But in this moment, the pain of one family - of six families - of our mother Rachel - feels just as strong.
God promises that our children will come home. But together with Rachel, we will not stop crying until they do. And perhaps not even then.