To Mourn, To Dance, To Hope

A beloved passage from Ecclesiastes sees life as a series of dichotomies, of diverse “seasons,” with a “time for every experience under heaven…a time to be born and a time to die…a time to mourn and a time to dance…” But existence is often less orderly and more complex. It is not always either/or.

Last year on the morning of Simchat Torah, after an evening of exuberant dancing and celebration, we awoke to a barbarous nightmare of cruelty and slaughter whose agony still resonates and even now, grows. How could we dance this year on Simchat Torah under the unbearable burden of loss — the many murdered, the hostages suffering unimaginably, the ultimate sacrifices made daily by Israel’s young and not so young soldiers, and their loved ones?

And yet the State of Israel lives. The Jewish People lives. Unlike Jews of countless other eras who also endured demonic hate, we are not powerless. We are empowered, resilient, determined. We defend ourselves and our Jewish State relentlessly against all who seek our destruction.

Simchat Torah has been transformed. As the beloved Israeli poet, Yehuda Amichai wrote in his famous poem, “A Man in His Life,” we must, “with the same eyes, laugh and cry.” Now and henceforward, on Simchat Torah we will both mourn and dance. On the festival day we recited the timeless words of Yikzor, prayers of grief and remembrance, our eyes brimming with tears. We promise we will never forget.

But in the evening we danced with the Torah. Our steps were fewer, slower, halting, heavy, our singing more subdued, dedicated to the lost, the living and the displaced, and to those who protect, care for and help them and us, military and civilian. Our sombre circling expressed our resolute refusal to give up on life, to let hatred destroy our State, our People or our belief in the possibility of a better, peaceful future for us and for the whole human family.

After all, Israel’s national anthem is HaTikvah, The Hope.