Shared Hugs

Emotional pain doesn’t take well to wearing a cast. A broken heart doesn’t heal the same way a fractured forearm does. Actually, such pain grows twice as big when it’s encased, when it’s held inside, when it’s left unshared. 

This truth hit home this week as we visited Northern Israel. Yesterday we visited the region’s hardest hit Kibbutz (Manara) where 74% of its homes were destroyed by Hezbollah rockets. 240 rockets for 260 residents. After visiting the region’s largest City, Kiryat Shemona, where only some of its 22,000 residents have returned, we visited the Druze religion’s community in the upper Golan Heights where 12 Israeli Druze children were murdered while playing soccer last July. 

We prayed at the field where Shadi, pictured right center, was making his first return visit. Hazem, age 15, and Alma, age 11, were part of his extended family. Pain that’s shared feels more right-sized. And Sabah, pictured with us, left center, who hopes to go to Med School in Europe, told us about her father’s best friend’s uncle who is Syrian, also Druze, who is currently letting IDF soldiers lodge in his home in return for the food they’re providing. Basic human decency and dignity can and do abide among the good-hearted.

This week’s portion of Torah includes the Ten Commandments. And it’s named for a fellow-traveler of a different faith, Yitro. He’s a Midianite Priest. And yet, he teaches Moses, coaching him on how to delegate leadership more effectively. That is, he turns Moses our teacher into Moses the learner. And, of course, the very best teachers are the best learners. Yitro’s advice attends to Moses’ emotional state. “You’ll surely wear yourself out” (Ex. 18:18) if you don’t share burdens. How true and timely. 

We’re a lot better at spotting our enemies than at embracing our friends. This is probably important for our safety. But identifying our friends is also important for our sanity. 

We’d best not let the cruel habits of those who seek our harm tune our hearts to cruelty. It’s the emotional equivalent of shrapnel, that dents and disfigures our beliefs in people. Yes, we’re too experienced to be naive. But we’re also too experienced to be misled. Yitro inspires Moses. Those who make up the Druze faith inspire hope that our future will feature dignified coexistence. 

Shared hugs are a lot more healing for our hearts and our faiths.